THE QUEST FOR EXCELLENCE
This publication has been made possible by generous donations from the following:
The S. R Ho Foundation Limited Dr Ho Tim The Lee Hysan Found.tion I;-imited Sir Yuet-keung Kan Dr Alice Kiu-yue Lam Sir Quo-weiLee Dr Kau-kui Leung Mr Sin Wai.kin
A History of The Chinese University of
Hong Kong from 1963 to 1993
Edited by Alice N. H. Lun NG
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The Chinese University Press
c The Chinese University of Hong Kong 1994
All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from The Chinese University of Hong Kong.
ISBN 962-20f-606-5
THE CHINESE'l:Jll!IVERSITY PRESS
The Chinese University of Hong Kong SHATIN, N.T., HONG KONG
Printed in Hong Kong by Nam Fung Printing Co., Ltd.
Contents
Foreword by the Chancellor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Rt. Hon. Christopher PATTEN viii
Foreword by the Pro-Ch?Jlcellor Sir Yuet-keung KAN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . x
Foreword by Chairman of the University Council Sir Quo-wei LEE xii
Congratulatory Message from the Founding Chancellor Sir Robert BLACK xiv
Congratulatory Message from the Third Chancellor . . . . . . . . . . . Lord MACLEHOSE of Beoch xvi
Congratulatory Message from the Fifth Chancellor Lord WILSON of Tillyorn xvii
Pref ace . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Alice N. H. Lun NG xix
Acknowledgements ........... : . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxv
1. The Founding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Alice N. H. Lun NG 1
2. A New Society, New Knowledge, and a New University ................................... . Bernard Hungkay LUK 35
3. Institutional Changes ............................... . Tak Sing CHEUNG 81
4. Chinese Studies and Cultural Integration ............... . Sze-kwang LAO 125
5. Moving with the Times: the University and Hong Kong .... Chong Chor LAU 165
6. Overseas Academic Links and International Exchanges . . . . WONG Kin Yuen 199
7. The Students . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
KWOK Siu-tong
8. Service to Society . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
Hon-ming YIP
9. Friends of the University . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
Mayching KAO and Chung Kee YEUNG
10. The Alumni: A Composite Portrait 327
Sonia S. H. NG
Looking Ahead .......................... ; . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357
Charles K. KAO
Appendices: Records and Statistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 361
Leslie Nai-kwai LO List of Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395 Major References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 397 A Chronicle of Events . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 399 Index 405
GOVERNMENT HOUSE
��
�����`���� HONG KONG
Foreword
As the Chancellor of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, I was delighted to learn of the�Pdecision to publish this book.in commemoration of the University's 30th Anniversary.
This book traces the development of the University's three founding post-secondary colleges between 1949 and, 1956, provides the background to'the inauguration of the Chinese University in 1963 and highlights its major academic and institutional developments since then. �P I am sure that it will be of great interest to CUHK .taff, students, alumni and anyone who wants to know more about th. University.
Those who wish to have a deeper understanding.of.the unique educational philosophy'of the University will also'find
. this book useful. In keeping with its motto "To broaden one's intellectual horizon is to-keep within the bounds of propriety", the Chinese University has placed an equal emphasis on the intellectual and moral aspects of education. It has sought to preserve and enrich Chinese cultural traditions while, at the same time, achieve a balance between Chines. and Western cultures.
2
Being Hong Kong's second university, CUHK has been playing a.vital part in our education system in increasing the access of young people to tertiary education -. an important objective of Government's education policy. In 1963, the newly established University had only 87 academic staff, offering 17 degree cour,;es to about 1,300 students. By 1993, the number of academic staff surpassed. 700. And more than 100 undergraduate and postgraduate courses are now offered to a student population of over 10,000. Many of.its graduates are now in key positions in our community, making a substantial contribution to Hong Kong's prosperity and success.
On the occasion of its 30th Anniversary, I send my warmest congratulations to the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Long may it continue its uniqu,:, mission and retain its
. distinctive academic profile among the tertiary .academic institutions in Hong Kong.
�G�G��
Governor
Foreword
Time indeed flies! In the twinkling of an eye, as it would seem, The Chinese University of Hong Kong has reached the age of thirty. Thirty years is not a long time in the history of a university, but The.Chinese University that we see today is already a well-established institution with a solid foundation for instruction and research. It has demonstrated high calibre both in academic pursuits and community service. It is most gratifying to witness the growth of this youthful university with all its vigour and energy.
Due to the continuous efforts of staff, students, alumni, Council members, as well as friends of the University1 The Chinese University has developed rapidly and earned itself a place in the international academic community within such a short span of time. With a special mission to integrate traditional Chinese culture and Western learn-ing ever since its inception, the University has also been able to produce an. envirornnent conducive to research and free scholarly mqurry.
I frrst joined the University Council in 1964, assumed 9hairmanship in 1971, and was appointed by the Governor of Hong Kong to be the first Pro-Chancellor of the University in 1982. Over the years, I have been closely involved in planning-the development of the University, and I liken the task to tendering a young sprout. I have followed the various stages of its development, watching with amazement and pleasure as it grows from strength to strength with the addition of each new�P department, faculty, research�P institute, or member college. I am particularly pleased at the high academic status it now enjoys on the international scene, and the outstanding achievements of its graduates in various professions.
Fully equipped for more important tasks at its thirtieth birthday and under the capable leadership of Vice-Chancellor Kao, I am convinced that the University will advance with giant strides and achieve a new level of excellence in the 21st century. The publication of this history of the University does notonly bear testimony to its efforts and struggles
over the last thirty years, but also provides insight into its future as it quests continually for excellence.
SirY. K. Kan, GBE, BA, LLD, JP Pro-Chancellor of the University
Foreword
Established in 1963, The Chinese University of Hong Kong has now reached the age of thirty, or the age of standing on one's own feet. Like a person at thirty, it is full of vigour and vitality, and is ready to work hard to realize its ideals and to contribute to the community.
I well remember when the University was first founded, Sir Cho-yiu Kwan served as Chairman of the University Council, Dr R. C. Lee as Vice-Chairman, and I as Treasurer. We had to start everything from scratch. Sir Cho-yiu and Dr Lee faced all sorts of problems trying to persuade the Hong Kong government to grant a tract of land in Ma Liu Shui to the University as its permanent campus site. They were even-tually successful, and the site obtained, then a barren hill top, is now a flourishing university campus with rows and rows of buildings. As the University celebrates its 30th anniversary, although both Sir Cho-yiu and Dr Lee are no longer with us, their great contributions to the University will be always remembered and our fond memories of them will persist. The University's magnificent campus, on the other hand,
-was masterminded by Dr I. M. Pei, an internationally renowned ar-chitect, and Dr Szeto Wai, University Architect. Another important founder of the University is Sir Yuet-keung Kan, who took over the reins of the Council in 1971 and served as Chairman until 1982, when he was appointed by the Governor as Pro-Chancellor of the University. Under his leadership, the University made great headway in its overall development. Indeed, the University has been most fortunate is being able to benefit from the support and encouragement of 'various Council members as well as friends from Hong Kong and overseas. To them we feel deeply grateful.
At this particular point in time when we celebrate the 30th anniver-sary of the University and try to put on record its past endeavours, we cannot but call to mind our founding Vice-Chancellor, Dr Choh-ming Li. A man .of great learning and foresight, Dr Li was the first to emphasize the need to blend Chinese and Western cultures and to build a university that could combine the best of both the East and the West.
His idealism, energy and strong determination set a good example for the University community as a whole, and on the foundation he laid both Professor Ma Lin and Professor Charles Kao have successfully built a sophisticated institute of higher learning whose achievements have been outstanding. All members of the University Council wish to express their deep appreciation of the efforts of the University's Vice-Chancellors past and present.
I feel greatly honoured be able to write these few words as foreword to this book. It is my sincere wish that staff and students of the Univer-sity will keep high their spirits as they march into a new century and take up new challenges.
Sir Quo-wei Lee, CBE, LLD, DBA, JP Chairman of the University Council
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,Congratulatory Message from Sir Robert Black, the Founding Chancellor.
From: Lord MacLehose of Beach K.T.
Secretary -London 01-351 6918
Beach. Maybole, Ayrshire, KA19 8EN Telephone 0655 83114
Message from Lord MacLehose for the Anniversary Publication of C.U.H.K.
In its first thirty years of growth the C.U.H.K. has held
to its goal of offering the best of Chinese and Western
cultures. With this same goal it should surely have a great
future in the years ahead and I wish it all success.
Congratulatory Message from Lord MacLehose of Beoch K. T., Chancellor from 1971 to 1982.
LORD WILSON OF TILLYORN GCMG
TILL YORN FINZEAN ABERDEENSHIRE AB31 3PN TEL: FEUGHSIDE 667
This year The Chinese University of Hong Kong reaches one of the key milestones set by Confucius for the stages of maturity -its thirtieth bir_thday. �P Within that relatively short period of time, The Chinese Ul).iversity has made an enormous contribution to higher education in Hong Kong. Its graduates have enhanced the life of the territory in every walk of. life and can now be found applying their skills in many other parts of the world as well. The University owes much to its�P founders and benefactors. Above all though, its success in the future, as in the past, will depend on its students and its staff. To all those involved with the University I send my warmest congratulations on this important anniversary.
Congratulatory Message from Lord Wilson of Tillyorn GCMG, Chancellor from 1987 to 1992.
Preface
The founding of The Chinese University of Hong Kong in 1963 marked a new era in the development of higher education in Hong Kong. It marked the birth of a second university in the territory, using both Chinese and English as the medium of instruction, thus providing greater opportunities for brilliant young men and women in Hong Kong to receive a university education. The new university embodied the unique educational experiences and ideals of its three constituent Col-leges, namely, the Chinese Confucian humanism of New Asia College, the Western Christian spirit of Chung Chi College and the Hong Kong-oriented pragmatism of United College. The goals of the University, at the time of its founding, aimed at the preservation and enrichment of Chinese culture, the exploration of modern Western know ledge and the integration of the cultures of East and West. Meanwhile, the University was also committed to nurturing talents in the service of a rapidly changing Hong Kong which was on the threshold of developing into a modern metropolis.
The latter half of the twentieth century has been a period of dynamism; encompassing a knowledge explosion and technological breakthroughs. It is also a period in which Hong Kong, at the crossroads of East and West, is experiencing important changes in its political, social, economic and cultural life. From what was considered to be a transitional, rootless society, Hong Kong has gradually built up its identity as an independent entity. It has become a metropolis playing important roles in international commerce, industry, finance and com-munications.
The Chinese University,though very young still as it is today, has grown together with Hong Kong in these exciting and crucial periods of challenges and changes. It is befitting, at the University's thirtieth anniversary, to recall how the forerunners of the University fought their way for due recognition and how the University has pushed steadily forward with its vision, idealism and hard work.
To meet the needs of the times and societal changes in Hong Kong,
and to accomplish the missions of enhancing Chinese culture and in-
tegrating Chinese and Western knowledge and learning, The Chinese
University has met with many problems in its various stages of develop-
ment. To deal with these problems, the University has made correspond-
ing adjustments, implemented new plans and set itself ambitious
objectives.
The establishment of the University was achieved through the amal-
gamation of three Colleges, each with a history of over ten years, under �P a federal system at the recommendation of the Fulton Report of 1963. In terms of manpower and teaching resources, it can be said that The Chinese University was in a more advantageous position compared with other newly-established universities. However, the creation of a central system in a university that had inherited the different ideals of its three Colleges did present a very difficult task for the first Vice-Chancellor,
Dr Choh-ming Li, during his tenure of office (1963-1978).
At the outset of the founding of the University, the three constituent
�P Colleges continued to be responsible for instruction through the coor-
dination of the Boards of Studies of the Faculties of Arts, Science,
Social Science and Commerce under the aegis of the University Senate.
They set up new courses and, later, inter-collegiate courses to reduce
duplication. The School of Education and the Graduate School were
established in 1965 and 1966 respectively. Even from the earliest days
of the University, Vice-Chancellor Li made every effort.to earn interna-
tional recognition for it by inviting noted scholars from all over the
world to act as its advisers, external assessors and examiners. Staff and
student exchange programmes were set up with world-renowned
universities. Research institutes were established as early as 1965. Em-
phasis was put on scientific research to raise the academic quality of
the University. The construction of buildings and the layout of the
whole campus had begun to take shape at this time. United College
and New Asis College moved to Shatin in 1972 and 1973. Ten years
later, the federal system, adopted earlier by the University, was already
out of kilter with the operation of the University. It was for this reason
that after the Colleges were located on the Ma Liu Shui _campus, Vice-
Chancellor Li began to introduce reforms to the organization of the
University to achieve a more efficient use of resources. Although the
proposed modes of change led to controversial arguments, the second
Fulton Report of 1976 which recommended plans for reorganization of
the university structure clearly laid down a solid new foundation for the further development of the University.
In 1978, Professor Ma Lin succeeded Dr Li as the second Vice-Chancellor of the University. Professor Ma's main task was to imple-ment the reforms recommended by the second Fulton Report and to make plans for the development of the University under the new system. At the same time, Hong Kong had undergone important changes since the late seventies: the diversification of its economy, more openness in politics and society, and new developments pertaining to the future of Hong Kong and changing political conditions in China. How the University should meet the emerging needs became another major chal-lenge.
In 1981, after years of planning, the Faculty of Medicine formally enrolled its first batch of students. In the same year, part-time degree programmes were offered in Music, Chinese and English, Business Administration and Social Work. The University's course offerings became more varied; but meanwhile, there were more opportunities for specialized, professional education to meet the needs of society. The development of the Graduate School also reached a milestone: in 1980, the first two doctoral programmes were offered, in Electronics and in Chinese Literature, History and Philosophy. By 1987, the number of doctoral programmes had increased to fifteen and masters' programmes to thirty-eight. There were also significant accomplishments in promot-ing linkages with academic institutions overseas, and the University received support from various international or private funds. Meanwhile, with the opening and reform of China, the University estab-lished a number of exchange and cooperation programmes with many famous academic institutions in China, playing an important role in the bridging of Chinese and W estem learning. Groundwork for the estab-lishment of a fourth member College -Shaw College -was also started by Professor Ma in 1986, to add to the development potential of the University.
In 1987, Professor Charles Kao became the third Vice-Chancellor, bringing the University into yet another stage in its development. In tandem with the advance of high technology all over the world, the rapid growth of industry and commerce in Hong Kong, and the demands made by the transition period leading to the establishment of Hong Kong as a Special Administrative Region upon the assumption of
Chinese sovereignty in 1997, the society needed more graduates from various fields of higher education.
The University hence faced even greater challenges and developed with greater optimism and vitality under the leadership of Professor Kao. Reforms on different aspects of the University were introduced. On the academic structure, a flexible credit-unit system was adopted. This not only settled the controversy regarding the three-year or four-year programme, it also enabled the University to open more academic departments, offer more courses and allowed more joint offerings with selected universities around the world. In university administration, the restructuring of the central administrative units and the delegation of more responsibility, authority and accountability to the faculties and departments were among the major reforms in bringing about greater efficiency. Meanwhile, Vice-Chancellor Kao proceeded to strengthen the ties of the University with overseas academic institutions and com-mercial corporations through the creation of the Office of Academic Links and the Office of Industrial and Business Development. The Faculty of Engineering was established and new courses were offered in Architecture, Nursing and Pharmacy. The Graduate School was ex-panded and more research units were' created to enhance the University's academic standing and international reputation. At present, the University has seven research institutes, engaging in research in the humanities, business and industry, social science, technology, medicine, as well as interdisciplinary studies, to create and develop new frontiers in academic knowledge.
This book is the English version, but not exactly a translation, of the University's thirtieth commemorative volume on the history of the University, published in Chinese, in September 1993. With ten chapters written by academics and alumni from different disciplines, the book constitutes a multi-faceted review of the University's development from embryo to adulthood. The first two chapters focus on the background of the founding of the University and its growth over the past thirty years. The other chapters deal with specific aspects of the University covering topics pertaining to its institutional changes, academic endeavours, in-ternational linkages, service to the community, its ben_efactors, students and alumni. Our Vice-Chancellor, Professor Charles Kao, has also contributed an article on his vision of the objectives and directions of the future development of the University. As it is intended thateach chapter
can also be read independently, there is inevitably some overlapping in a few places in the book. Nevertheless, thanks to the able contribution of the indexer Dr Paul Kwong, these overlapping contents can now be cross referenced.
We have aimed at being faithful to the records of history and, to avoid premature judgement, have tried to maintain a detached attitude towards more recent issues. Yet no attempt has been made to achieve any consensus in the interpretation of events or form of writing style.
It is hoped that through this book, readers will come to a better understanding of the ideals and missions of the University, as well as its problems, difficulties and achievements, and see how the University, in its constant quest for excellence, has moved with the times and growth of Hong Kong.
Alice N. H. Lun NG May, 1994
Acknowledgements
The publication of this book and the Chinese edition which appeared earlier in September 1993 was made possible by the effort, assistance and generous support of many to whom the editor owes deep apprecia-tion and gratitude.
The genesis. of this book lies with Sir Quo-wei Lee, Chairman of the University Council, who first suggested the publication of a history of the University on its thirtieth anniversary. Without Sir Q. W.' s initiative and encouragement, this book might never have appeared. Professor Charles Kao, our Vice-Chancellor, helped make the book project a reality with his personal involvement, advice and unfailing support. Deep gratitude is due to both of them.
Special thanks are a,lso due to the Rt. Hon. Christopher Patten, the Chancellor; Sir Yuet-keung Kan, the Pro-Vice-Chancellor and again to Sir Quo-wei Lee for their kindness in writing the forewords to the book. We are also grateful to the former Chancellors, Sir Robert Black, Lord Maclehose and Lord Wilson for sending us congratulatory messages. The editor was fortunate too, in having the opportunity ,f visiting Sir Robert last summer and obtained valuable information from his reminiscences of the founding of the University.
The editor wishes to acknowledge, in addition, her sincere thanks for advice and help given her by Professor Ambrose King, Pro-Vice-Chancellor; Mr Jacob Leung, the University Secretary and Mr T. L. Tsim, the Director of the University Press,
Many others have helped in making available library materials and documentary data for the writing of this book. Indebtedness is due in particular to the staff of the Hong Kong Public Record Office and the Education and Manpower Bra_nch of the Hong Kong Government Secretariat. The University Secretariat, the Registry, Office of Student Affairs, other administrative units, research institutes;as well as various faculty and department offices of this University also responded rapidly to requests for assistance. Gratitude goes to all in equal measures.
Three former colleagues of the University gave their assistance,
each in a special way. Dr So Siu Hing, former Senior Assistant Registrar, helped with the translation; Dr Paul Kwong, formerly of the Sociology Department, provided the book with a very useful and com-prehensive index; Mr John Gannon, former Dean of the Faculty of Arts, took up the important task of reading through the entire manuscript and offered valuable comments. Their contributions are recorded with thanks.
Last but not least, sincere thanks must be acknowledged here again to all the contributors for their participation and effort in making this book a success.
Ground-breaking ceremony of New Asia College campus at Farm Road, 1955.
Early "Campus Work Scheme." Dr A. T. Roy working with Chung Chi students on campus
site, 1950s.
Press conference, announcing the establishment of a new Chinese University, June 1959. Dr F. I. Tseung (left), Mr J. S. Crozier (centre).
The Vice-Chancellor and Presidents of the Constituent Colleges, 1964. (From left) Ch'ien Mu, Choh-ming Li, C. Y. Yung and T. C. Cheng.
Foundation-stone laying ceremony day of United College, Shatin campus, March 1971.
Student rally for the Protection of Diaoyutai, 1971.
Royal visit: Prince Philip at the Art Gallery during a visit to the University on 6 May 1975.
The Second Fulton Commission, 1976. (From left) Mr I.C.M. Maxwell, Sir Michael Herries, Lord Fulton of Falmer and Professor C. K. Yang.
The outgoing Vice-Chancellor, Dr Choh-ming Li and the new Vice-Chancellor, Dr Ma Lin ( 1978).
Visit of Mr Ji Peng-fei, Director of the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office, to the University on 15 December 1985.
The newly installed Vice-Chancellor, Professor Charles Kao with his wife Mrs Gwen Kao, 15 October 1987.
Grand opening of Shaw College, 2 March 1990.
Student rally at Sir Run Run Shaw Hall on campus, October 1988.
Thirtieth Anniversary Exhibition at the City Hall, March 1993.
1
The Founding
Alice N. H. Lun NG
Sir Robert Black officiating at the inauguration ceremony of the University, 17 October 1963
Background: The main entrance, University campus
�P The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) was officially in-augurated on 17 October 1963.Its origin, however, can be traced back to the late 1940swhen the three Colleges -New Asia, Chung Chi and United -first appeared as private collegesset up by refugee scholars from China. It took almost fifteen years for these.colleges to fight their way to university status and to become constituent Colleges of the second university in Hong Kong, using Chinese as the principal medium of instruction.This was an important breakthrough in the cultural and educational development of Hong Kong, as British traditionfor long was to maintain no more than one government-supported university in a governed-territory,and English was used as the official languageand medium of instruction.
This chapter, in accounting for the founding of the University, goes into the background of the emergence of private colleges in Hong Kong in the late 1940s, and the educational missions, and difficulties en-countered by the three Colleges in the early 1950s. Their joint efforts in striving for due recognition, and developments leading to 'the estab-lishment of the University, are seen in the light of the changing social, economic and political situation of Hong Kong, the role of the govern-ment, as well as support from the international organizations and the local community.
1. New Demands for Higher Education in Hong Kong
Provision of university education in Hong Kong began with the estab-lishment of the University of Hong Kong (HKU) in 1911. Its main objective, as defined by its founders, was to serve "as a centre for Sino-British contact in the sphere of learning and th.e maintenance of good understanding with the neighbouring country of China." ( quoted in the report by B. Mouat Jones and W. Adams, typescript, 1950, United Kingdom, p. 7) It was agreed that if it were merely for Hong Kong itself, there was no need for the establishment of a university. During the pre-war period, HKU, in fact, served mainly as an outpost of Western' culture, admitting students from Southeast Asia, China, as well as Hong Kong. When it was decided in 1946 that the greatly war-damaged university should be re-established, the matter was still considered from the point of view of imperial rather than local needs, as it was stated. "Because of the need to maintain British position and prestige in the Far
East." (Report of Cox Committee to the Secretary of State for the Colonies, 1946, p. 3) It was in the Jones-Adam Report of 1950 that mention was made, for the first time, that the University should reflect the needs of Hong Kong society.
The objective of meeting the needs .of Hong Kong society was put to immediate test in the early 1950s. Events of the civil war in China (1946-1949), the Korean War (1950-1953) and the United Nations embargo on China, brought about immediately important socio-economic changes and problems in Hong Kong. There was an influx of refugees, increasing the local population from 1.5 million in 1947 to more than 2.2 million in 1950. The embargo then brought a fatal blow to Hong Kong's entrepot trade, which had been the territory's economic life. For survival, Hong Kong turned to industrialization. Lacking natural resources, manpower skill and knowledge became its most valu. able resources. At the same time, there was a call in Hong Kong for more intellectual activities. Among the refugees who flocked to Hong Kong were some well-known scholars and experienced educators. Con-tinued turbulence in China had caused the withdrawal of foreign academic organizations and the interruption of international cultural activities in the mainland. Hong Kong, from now on, was to play a more active role in Chinese and Western cultural contacts.
A more direct challenge came from the need for further educational provision. Demand for more school places was caused not only by the increase of population but also by the fact that among the incoming refugees, there was a large number of students ranging from primary to university levels who wanted to continue their education in Hong Kong. The result was a great expansion of the student population, especially in the Chinese middle schools. This in tum brought a demand for more teachers who, according to an Education Ordinance passed in 1952, must possess certificates or degrees recognized by the Hong Kong government. Meanwhile, as the way for Chinese middle school graduates to return to China for further education was blocked, the supply of university places for those who wanted to continue their education in Hong Kong became a problem. A British university with English as the mediu!Il of instruction and a pretty high standard of English Language as a compulsory subject in the entrance examination, HKU offered very little chance for Chinese middle school graduates to gain admission.
All these factors contributed to an unprecedented need in Hong Kong for greater provision of higher education. A special committee composed, for the first time entirely of local residents; was appointed in 1951 by the Governor, Sir Alexander Grantham, to look into the prob-lem. The report of the committee, popularly kno.n as the Keswick Report, gave a detailed review of the supply of higher education in Hong Kong. The Report was the first document that publicly proposed that higher education in Hong Kong should be provided primarily for the needs of Hong Kong itself. Development to meet the increasing demand for the training of secondary school teachers to meet the needs of the expanded student population was undoubtedly an urgent com-munity need. The committee was also aware�P of the unique situation of Hong Kong in serving as a meeting place for Chinese and Western cultures, and thus for a need to nurture talents who could be well versed in both. Its proposed solution was to introduce in HKU degree courses in arts and sciences, using Chinese as the medium of instruction. Fur-thermore, the University was to establish extramural study progra.es and evening diploma courses to meet the needs of the general public.
The Keswick Report did not accept the idea of a separate Chinese university, the reason given was based on administrative and financial grounds, believing that HKU, with its established position and facilities, would be able to adapt to meet the new demands. The basic attitude, however, was that HKU should remain the only institution to award degrees in Hong Kong.
The call for HKU to meet the challenge was accepted by the govern-ment. Government funding was immediately allocated to the University for the introduction of Chinese-medium courses beginning from the 1952-1953 academic year. However, within the campus response dif-fered. The proposal to establish Chinese language courses in arts and sciences received a majority support from the Senate, but it was turned down by the Council in a meeting just months before the 1952 term started. This was perhaps a very practical decision as the time left for preparation and the funding appropriation were both inadequate. There was also an underlying fear that introduction of Chinese medium cour-ses would eventually "transform the university." The explanation given by the Council was that, after a period of reconstruction and develop-ment since 1946, what the university needed most was time for con-" solidation rather than taking up any new direction in its development.
The proposal to establish in HKU Chinese-medium courses was
further turned down by Ivor Jennings and Douglas Logan, experts in
British university administration, invited in 1953 to advise on the
development ofHKU. Both of them were assertive in maintaining HKU
as an English-speaking university. As far as they were concerned, it was
the role of the government to fill the gap between the University and the
Chinese middle schools, so that students could compete for entry into
the more popular faculties of medicine and engineering, and not just arts
and sciences. The University could help, on the other hand, by oversee-
ing the establishment of a junior college as a possible bridge.
Recommendations of the Keswick Report and the Jennings-Logan
Report served as important guidelines adopted by the government in
dealing with the problems of education in Hong Kong. Funds were
allocated to HKU for consolidation as well as development; one par-
ticular objective was. the establishment of the Extramural Studies
Department and the Institute of Oriental Studies. To prepare the way for
Chinese middle school graduates to seek admission into HKU, a special
two year programme was designed to be set up at Clementi Middle
School. Yet such a scheme would take a few more years to mature and
also it could accommodate only a very limited number of students. The
task of meeting the new challenge had already been taken up by a
number of private colleges with only rather crude facilities, but run by
dedicated and experienced university teachers and scholars from China.
The emergence of these challenges began a new page in the history of
the development of higher education in post-war Hong Kong, and also
marked the first step in the eventual establishment of CUHK.
2. Founding and Early Difficult Days of the Colleges
With the changing political scene in China and an influx of refugees which brought about an unprecedented need for Chinese education in Hong Kong, a new force, rooted in China and embracing the mission of propagating Chinese culture and educating the young, had arrived in the territory. Driven by educational ideals, .s well as the need to earn a . living, these scholars or professionals in various fields made use of , crudef acilities and rented classrooms to establish the so-called "refugee colleges." According to a government survey conducted in 1952, there
were more than thirty colleges of this kind, but they were of varied standards. Most of them offered short-term courses ranging from six months to two years. Nine of these, however, were of a higher standard offering four-year programmes in arts and commerce. Amongst these were New Asia, Chung Chi and the forerunners of United College, which were to emerge as Foundation Colleges of The Chinese Univer-sity. Their beginnings and early years of struggle reveal not only the background of the founding of the University but also its roots, its characteristics, and educational ideals.
New Asia College had a very modest beginning as an evening school named Asia Evening College of Arts and Commerce. It was founded in October 1949 by Ch'ien Mu and Tsui Shu-chin, both well-known scholars fleeing China. They were shortly joined by Tang Chun-i and Tchang Pi-kai, also refugee scholars from national universities in China. Their main objective was to carry on their educational ideal of promoting traditional Chinese humanistic studies in Hong Kong. The school held classes only in the evening in a rented school premises in Kowloon, offering courses in Chinese literature and history, philosophy, economics and political science. Support in paying the rent came from a Mr Liu, who was the registered supervisor of the school. In less than a year, the school ran into financial difficulty as the supervisor withdrew. Rescue came from another individual, Mr Arthur E. Wang (Wang Yueh-feng) who was an architect from Shanghai engaged in the con-struction business in Hong Kong, and an ardent believer in Chinese tradition. It was with his support that the school was reorganized into a daytime institution, renamed New Asia College, and housed in larger premises at K weilin Street. This marked the beginning of what is known as the Kweilin Street period in the history of the College, during which a strong sense of commitment for the preservation and propagation of Chinese culture was affirmed, and identified with the College. This period is also well-remembered for its struggle, and growth "with no government support, no aid from organizations and no backing from foundations." The College was faced with great financial difficulties as Arthur E. Wang's business went into bankruptcy two months after the College's inauguration and Tsui Shu-chin also left Hong Kong for Taipei. Ch'ien, Tang and Tchang had no other way but to turn to their friends and acquaintance for aid. This was recalled and described in later days by the College's founders as the act of "a beggar." Teachers
were given no fixed salaries, and were paid on an hourly basis which
was so meagre that Ch'ien and the others had to depend on small
additional income from contributions to newspapers and journals.
The number of registered students at New Asia was small during
these early days. In 1949, the enrolment figure was 65. In 1950 it was
reduced to around 40, and students from poor families or those exiled
from the mainland accounted for the majority. Although the College
tried to provide free tuition as far as possible, many students had to drop
out to work for a livelihood, while some withdrew because of emigra-
tion to Taiwan or abroad. The high mobility of students only began to
stabilize gradually in 1953. The curriculum then consisted of Chinese,
English and general Chinese history as common required courses; while
other courses in Chinese literature and history, philosophy and educa-
tion, economics, and commerce were offered in four different depart-
ments. Obviously the strength of the College came mainly from the
expertise of Ch'iert Mu, Tang Chun-i, Tchang Pi-kai, Yang Yu-mei and
a few others. There were during these years a number of refugee
scholars who came to teach at the College for a short time before taking
up positions elsewhere, locally or abroad. Limited by a small budget, the
College was unable to keep many of the worthy scholars.
Prompted by enthusiasm for the promotion of scholarship, the Col-
lege set up in 1950 a series of lectures on cultural studies open to the
public free of charge. Among the audience were students and intellec-
tuals rom the Hong Kong community as well as refugees and visitors
f from different comers of the world. The lectures continued over four years and helped to a great extent to carry the name of New Asia far and wide. In these early difficult years, both the teachers and students of New Asia College, through their perseverance in the pursuit of knowledge and the promotion of Chinese culture, had gradually gained the attention and sympathy of the public. Like New Asia, Chung Chi was founded by scholars and educators from China who wanted to carry on their educational work in Hong Kong. The College had, too, a very modest beginning and suffered considerable strains in the early years. Yet, with support from the .. Christian churches and missionary bodies, the College fought its way with relatively less hardship. The prime move for the establishment of the College came from
Rev. R. 0. Hall, then Bishop of the Hong Kong Anglican Church. Two other founders were Lee Ying-lin, former President of Lingnan Univer-sity, and Au Wei-Kuo (David W. K. Au), former Council Chairman of St. John's University of Shanghai. Their aim was to restore the educa-tional ideals of the Christian universities in China which had been closed or reorganized, and some of the teaching staff and students exiled to Hong Kong. They saw also the need for higher education for Hong Kong secondary school graduates who could not be admitted into HKU. This concern was shared by other church leaders. A provisional council was set up for the establishmentin Hong Kong of a Christian institution of higher education to be named Chung Chi, literally meaning "reverence for Christ." Members of the council were various church leaders of different denominations and nationalities. They included representatives from the American Presbyterian and Methodist missions in Hong Kong, principals of six leading local Christian secondary schools and Professor Ma Kiam, Professor of Chinese at HKU. The Council Chairman was David W. K. Au.
As HKUwas then the only degree-granting higher institute recog-nized by the government, Bishop Hall at an early stage sought the cooperation and assistance of the University in order to secure recog-nized degree status for the graduates of the proposed College. A formal proposal was submitted, requesting consideration of the University to conduct examinations in Chinese for students of the proposed College for the award of external degrees. The proposal was rejected by the University Senate, on the ground that external examinations in Chinese would entail complicated responsibilities beyond the capacities of the University. The Hong Kong government was also cautious. It granted only permission for the College to open evening�Pclasses at post-secon-dary level based on the first year curriculum of Christian universities in pre-1950 China.
Officially opened in October 1951, Chung Chi College was housed in the premises of St. Pauls Co-educational College and offered initially only evening classes. Yet, with the help provided by various local missionary bodies, it became a full-day post-secondary college with a four-year programme in September 1952. Student enrolment was in-creased from 63 in 1951 to 192 by 1952. The first batch of students were mostly the so-called "exiled students," and were more mature in terms of age. In 1952, 60% of the freshmen were from the Hong Kong Chinese
The Founding
middle schools and 15% from Anglo-Chinese schools. There were a small number from Southeast Asia. The majority of the teaching staff were from Christian universities in China and some held higher degrees from distinguished universities in the United States. They were, for instance, D. Jung, an EdD from Stanford University, Wang Shu-lin and Kent Chun Mark, both from Columbia University. By 1953, the College had four departments: Foreign Language, Economics and Business Ad-ministration, Sociology and Education, and Chinese Language. The curricula retained much of the features of Christian liberal colleges in China. Support for development in these early years came almost solely from church sources. The Anglican Church provided an initial fund on loan. Through the efforts of Bishop Hall and Lee Ying-lin, the first College President, the United Board of Chinese Christian Colleges in the United States (later known as United Board for Christian Higher Education in Asia) agreed to provide initial and regular periodic fund-ing. Subsidies then came later from the UK-based Association of Chinese Christian Universities and the Lingnan University Foundation in the United States. Yet much of the assistance was given on condition that the College secure Hong Kong government recognition as an in-stitute of higher education.
United College was officially established in 1956 by amalgamation of five colleges, Wah Kiu, Canton Overseas, Wen Hua, Kwang Hsia and' Ping Jing. They were mostly set up during 1946 to 1950, belonging to the group of the so-called "exiled colleges,." They were, in fact, formerly Canton-based private universities which had established branch cam-puses or affiliated middle schools in Hong Kong in the late 1930s when the Japanese invasion spread to South China. Two of the colleges, Ping Jing and Wah Kiu, actually had their origin in Hong Kong.
Ping Jing was set up in 1937 as a small evening accounting school in Hong Kong and moved to China in 1941 when Hong Kong fell to the Japanese. The school resumed operation in Hong Kong in 1946, with its headquarters still in Canton. It became, in 1950, a larger scale institute when the Ca.nton school merged with the Hong Kong branch, along with reinforcement of faculty members of other private universities from Canton. Named Ping Jing College of Accountancy, it operated evening classes, providing vocational training courses in accountancy and a day-time four-year curriculum with a Business Management Depart-ment and an Accountancy Department.
Wah Kiu had its origin in Hong Kong as a private academic institu-tion sponsored in 1937 by local Chinese who provided an endowment fund for a number of scholars from Canton to set up the College. The institution offered a four-year fully-fledged university curriculum in arts and commercial courses. Moved to China in 1941, Wah Kiu became a well.known private university in Canton, catering in particular for stu-dents from Hong Kong and overseas. When many scholars from the north retreated to the south in the midst of civil war in China around 1948-1949, some were offered positions in Wah Kiu. When the College moved to Hong Kong in 1949, with them were Ch' ien Mu, Tang Chun-i, Chiu Bing, Chien Ching-lien (C. L. Chien) and others. It is interesting to note that Ch'ien, Tang and Chiu became later the founders of New Asia College, and Chien became Inspector of the Private Post-secondary College Section of the Hong Kong Education Department. Moving to Hong Kong with the College were two hundred of its former students. Another two hundred were recruited locally afterwards. Most of the books and equipment were also successfully shipped out, thus from the start making Wah Kiu a better established private college in Hong Kong.
Canton Overseas was another college with a large enrolment which had close linkage with Hong Kong, in a slightly different way from the other two. Originally named Canton or Kwangchau University, it was a leading private university set up in Canton in 1927, In 1937 when the Japanese approached Canton, the university set up affiliated middle schools and temporary university lecture halls in various locations on Hong Kong Island, in Kowloon and in the New Territories. In early 1940, construction of a ge's5ij1BP\IS{15egan in the New Territorie., but
i
the whole institute had tii.ovf bic'k'to''fhe mainland when Hong Kong fell to the Japanese. When Canton University was evacuated from Canton again in 1949, it resumed operation in Kowloon under the name of Canton Overseas College. With it were more than three hundred students from Canton for whom a four-year cuniculum in arts, sciences and commerce was established.
Wen Hua and Kwang Hsia also had their origins in the vicinity of Canton and were relocated in Hong Kong in 1949. Both colleges were smaller in scale, but both offered four-year courses in arts and com-merce.
These five private colleges, some bringing with them students from -Canton, were of varied standards when they set up in rented premises in
The Founding
Hong Kong. Dependent on tuition fees from students who were mostly from refugee families, these colleges were often in financial straits. Salaries for staff were extremely low and facilities almost at a mini-mum. Limited and occasional support coming from their Hong Kong alumni was usually in the form of scholarships. Other assistance also came in 1950 through the Sun Scholarship from Taiwan, and in 1952 from the Mencius Foundation Scholarship. The financial assistance to students did enable the brighter students and those from very poor families to continue with their studies. Yet staff salaries and facilities remained tightly restrained. Moreover, as the certificates awarded were not recognized by government, students who wanted higher education would have to seek opportunities to study abroad or even choose to enter the teachers' training colleges. Also, all the private colleges were sub-ject to the control of the Education Ordinance and supervision by the government Education Department, which restrained development in college administration and academic affairs.
3. Arrival of International Assistance, 1953-1956
The years 1953-1956 marked a critical period in the development of Chung Chi, New Asia and the formation of United College. It was during these years that the Colleges, at their most difficult time, began to receive assistance from a number of international academic organiza-tions which helped them lay the foundation for further development. During this period, however, each college was still fighting its own way, receiving support from different sources.
Chung Chi College was faced in 1953 with the possible termination of funding from the church organization, for continued support was conditional on its success in winning government recognition as a higher institution of learning in the Hong Kong education system. The College'.,s repeated requests for formal recognition addressed to the Director of Education received no reply. Perhaps how the College could fit into the Hong Kong education system was beyond the purview of the Education Department. Bishop Hall was unwilling to allow the matter to rest here. He took the matter directly to the Governor, Sir Alexander Grantham. Two leading persons in Hong Kong' s education, Dr Lindsay Ride, then Vice-Chancellor of HKU, and D.J.S. Crozier, Director of
Education, were invited to Government House to meet with the Gover-nor and the Bishop. In two subsequent meetings held between March and May, Hall explained in detail the founding objectives and situation of the College. It was in June 1953 that a proposal drafted by Crozier was brought by the Governor to the Executive Council for adoption. Chung Chi College was formally accepted as an institution of higher learning, a recognized post-secondary college and a "permanent com-ponent of Hong Kong education."
By adoption of the Governor-in-Council, Chung Chi's status won the confidence of the church. Yet, both the government and Chung Chi wanted to have the role of the College "as a permanent component of Hong Kong education" better defined. Chung Chi again aimed at de-gree-granting status while requesting the grant of a campus site at Ma Liu Shui. A committee chaired by K. E. Priestley, Professor of Educa-tion of HKU, was appointed to look into the matter.
The Priestley Report completed in March of 1954 made it clear that HKU should remain the only degree-granting institution in Hong Kong. The basic attitude of the Report was in fact, quite similar to that of the Jennings and Logan Committee, which was making recommendations for the development of HKU. The suggested options for the develop-ment of Chung Chi were (1) two-year post-secondary curriculum preparing students from Chinese middle schools to enter HKU; (2) four-year courses in Chinese language and economics for grant of degrees through HKU or the University of London, and (3) non-degree post-secondary courses for the training of personnel required by the government and Hong Kong society. The Report in targeting Chung Chi as a bridge between the. Chinese middle schools and HKU or as a junior college, brought in fact no innovation for its immediate development except the approval of the grant of a site at Ma Liu Shui which proved to be animportant asset to the college as well as to the future Chinese University.
Although Chung Chi had failed again in attempting to establish degree courses, with its legal status as a post-secondary college and an extensive campus, the College obtained the continued and active sup-port of the United Board for Christian Higher Education in Asia, the Lingnan Foundation and other overseas organizations. Various Chris-tian churches and missionary bodies in Hong Kong also donated funds for the construction of dormitories, and for the provision of equipment
and scholarships. Local and overseas missions even sent out well-known scholars to teach courses in, for instance, philosophy of life and sociology of education. The College Board of Governors was reor-ganized in 1954. In addition to a number of church representatives, prominent local businessmen and academics from other higher institu. tions were invited to serve on the Board. When Chung Chi moved onto the Ma Liu Shui campus with the completion of the first' phase. of construction in 1956, the College began to embark on a new stage of development. It had then nine departments with over 300 students, twenty-six full-time and thirty-four part-time teachers.
Without church support and without even local connections, inter-national assistance was of the greatest significance in enabling New Asia College to begin a new stage of its development. The assistance ,was secured through the hard work and accomplishments of the College itself. Right from the early days, the educational goals of the College, the dedication of �Pits founders, its association with visiting scholars passing through Hong Kong to or from institutions abroad, did help to spread the good name of New Asia, its achievements, as well as its difficult situation. It was at this time, in the early 1950s that the Yale-in-China Association, which had just retreated from China, intended to resume its former educational or medical work in cooperation with a
�P Chinese institution in the East. Professor Harry Rudin, representing the Association in making. the selection of a suitable institution, came to Hong Kong in 1953. He had already heard of New Asia and Ch'ien Mu from his colleagues of the Yale History Faculty, but it was through several meetings with Ch'ien, his staff and students, that Rudin was indeed impressed. As he recalled thirty years later, "The reputation of Ch'ien Mu, his greater interest in education than in making money, the spirit of the students as it became apparent at the graduation ceremonies I attend.d, and the admiration and affection that the faculty had for their leader, a loyalty of which I was made aware at a luncheon which was to acquaint me with the men working for Ch'ien Mu." (H. Rudin, "A Meeting of East and West in 1953," New Asia, 30th Anniversary Com-memorative Issue, 1979, p. 36)
The discussion between Rudin and Ch'ien Mu showed Ch'ien's .. great concern for the College's academic autonomy. While agreeing to give up a small subsidy offered by the President's Office from Taiwan, t as an assurance of being clear of. any political association with the
Taiwan government, Ch'ien wanted no church education to be intro-duced into the College and no interference from the Yale-in-China Association in the internal administration of the College. But he agreed that the Association could appoint a representative to be stationed at the College.
Rudin was very cautious in making the final decision. He first sought the opinion of a number of his associates in Hong Kong, who all showed appreciation of the educational goals and work of the College. Among those expressing strong support were Preston Schayer, a Trus-tee and Executive Director of the New Haven Office of the Yale-in-China and, James Ivy, head of the newly established Hong Kong Office of the Asia Foundation. Rudin' s next step was to seek the opinion and approval of the Hong Kong government who had earlier showed con-cern over activities of the Asia Foundation in extending assistance to higher education in Hong Kong. Rudin met with D.J.S. Crozier, Direc-tor of Education, T. B. Morahan, Registrar, and another high-ranking officer of the government Education Department. Crozier was positive about New Asia's contribution to the study of Chinese culture and post-secondary education in Hong Kong. Yet he wanted assurance that no foreign government would be involved in the cooperation between Yale-in-China and New Asia, that the Association could not withdraw once commitment was made, and that a representative should be ap-pointed to New Asia to monitor the funding. These conditions indicated that the Hong Kong government was rather cautious about allowing educational assistance from the United States.
In his first meeting with Rudin, Ch'ien Mu had already indicated that his foremost concern was for a new college campus. When the formal agreement was signed between Yale-in-China and New Asia in allotting an annual subsidy of US$ 25,000 to the College, Rudin promised that he would seek other sources of assistance for the College's building fund. This was later secured from the Ford Founda-tion for the construction of a new building at Farm Road, a site granted to the College at the recommendation of Crozier. The College moved into the new campus in 1956. The Kweilin Street period came to an end. New Asia College, with further assistance from international organiza-tions such as the Asia Foundation, and the Harvard-Y enching Institute, was now in a firm position to carry out its educational ideal for the promotion of studies in Chinese culture.
When government approval was given for New Asia College to
receive aid from the Yale-in-China Association, the Asia Foundation
offered assistance to other private colleges. A limited s.bsidy was given
to individual teaching positions according to the academic qualifications
of the staff. This helped some of the colleges to retain or even to recruit
faculties with good academic qualifications. A few of the private col-
leges also emerged academically better organized.
The formation of United College through the amalgamation of the five colleges whose origins have been traced earlier in this chapter, was brought about by President of Columbia University, Grayson. in his visit to Hong Kong in 1956. Kirk was also an executive committee member of the Ford Foundation and a director of the Asia Foundation. He met with heads or representatives of many of the private colleges who approached him for assistance. Yet it was at the meeting with the Hong Kong alumni of Columbia University, among whom about fifteen were higher-degree holders from Columbia teaching in some of the private colleges, that Kirk came to have a better understanding of the situation of these colleges. Kirk suggested that they should merge to make better use of manpower and resources for more effective develop-ment. It was after a series of meetings and discussions that five of the private colleges -Wa. Kiu, Canton Overseas, Wen Hua, Kwang Hsia and Ping Jing, succeeded in merging to form the United College of Hong Kong, which was officially announced in June, 1956.
These five colleges shared a common background in being original-ly private universities in Canton and its vicinity, but having close links with Hong Kong. Yet, they had gone through a period of independent development and each had its own students, teachers, systems and curricula. In amalgamation, their foremost common objective was for the improvement of academic standards and curriculum development. Meanwhile, they also emphasized "democratic education," "academic freedom" and "commitment to meet the need of Hong Kong and over-seas students, and to shoulder the mission of the times and promote the exchange of Chinese and foreign cultures."
The organization of the Board of Trustees of the new college reflected its close relationship with the Hong Kong community. The Board had nineteen members, five of whom were former heads of ..the member colleges. Among the other fourteen, seven were repre-sentatives of other academic institutions in Hong Kong which included
for instance, the Asia Foundation, HKU and Chung Chi College. The remaining seven, however, were all prominent leaders of the Chinese community, most of whom were from established families in Hong Kong. Among them were the Hon. Sir Sik-nin Chau, member of the Executive Council and senior Chinese unofficial member of the Legis-lative Council, and a number of well-known businessmen and entrepreneurs. The Board agreed that the college president should be selected from among prominent Chinese scholars, but as a suitable candidate could not be found, the position was temporarily assumed by the Chairman of the Board, Dr F. I. Tseung, a prominent medical doctor and an earnest supporter of the development of higher education in Hong Kong.
Financial support for the College came mainly from the Asia Foun-dation, a rather meager sum of HK$ 30,000 per annum. Various existing scholarships and teachers' subsidies paid to the member colleges were transferred to the new College. With limited funding, the College was located in rented premises in Caine Road and classes were divided between daytime and evening sessions.
United College began its classes officially in October 1956. There were six hundred students, the majority of whom had transferred from the original member colleges, attending only the evening sessions. Only seventy students were enrolled as daytime students in the first recruit-ment held in summer 1956. There were twenty-seven full-time and fifty-nine part-time teachers. The curriculum included most of the sub-jects offered in the member colleges, with greater emphasis on applied studies in sociology, journalism, commerce, accounting, banking and business administration.
The formation of United College added a new element to the roots of the future federated Chinese University of Hong Kong. While Chung Chi had a strong Christian education background with a long history of international connections, and New Asia represented the fine qualities of Chinese national universities with emphasis on Chinese humanism, United College had a more open outlook, receptive to new ideas and with a strong commitment to local service. The next step on the road to the founding of The Chinese University sees the combined efforts of the three Colleges striving for due recognition and for the support of the government in their further development responding to the needs of Hong Kong society.
4. Striving for Due Recognition
After some years of struggle, both Chung Chi and New Asia had, by 1956, established a firm foundation, and even the newly established United College was able to stand on its own. Among the staff of the Colleges were renowned scholars and academics with higher degrees from well-known universities such as Stanford, Columbia and Yale. The curriculum embraced studies in Chinese tradition and humanism, as well as modem social sciences. The main educational goal was the promotion of Chinese culture along with a suitable response to the needs of Hong Kong society. The Colleges were providing alternative avenues for the increasing number of students, especially those from the Chinese secondary schools, who wished to further their studies in Hong Kong. The degrees already awarded had gained recognition from many univer-sities in America and Europe, some of which even granted scholarships to the more outstanding graduates. Yet in Hong Kong, the degrees were not recognized by the government, neither for employment nor for further training. Moreover, as private colleges, they received no support from the government but still had to be subject to the control of the Education Department and the Education Ordinance of 1952. Thus to improve the career paths of their students and to further develop them-selves, the three Colleges joined hands to strive for government recog-nition and support. This marked another important milestone in the founding of The Chinese University.
The struggle began with a memorandum dated 16 August 1956 addressed to Crozier by Charles Long, Yale-in-China repres'?ntative at New Asia and also a Trustee of the College. The paper was drafted after consultation with "representatives of three of the existing colleges." It discussed in detail problems concerning the status and standard of the colleges and validations of the degrees awarded. Issues brought up for government's consideration can be summed up under three major points. Firstly, the private colleges should not be governed by the Education Ordinance of 1952 which was intended to apply to primary and secondary education in Hong Kong. Special regulations, on the other hand, should be drawn up to determine the admission require-ments, teacher's academic qualifications and library facilities of col-leges that were aspiring to university standard. Secondly, as part of the Hong Kong education system, the colleges could not be dependent
entirely on the financial assistance of foreign missions, foundations or private donations. The government should take responsibility for providing support for basic facilities and recurrent expenses. Thirdly, under the existing government policy with HKU as the only degree-granting institute, "tho_usands of the more intelligent and ambitious young men have left Hong Kong in search of higher education, thus creating a great loss of leadership to the next generation." The memorandum concluded that it would be difficult for the existing private colleges to provide the best contribution to tertiary education, unless government __ support be provided for them to develop university status for the award of degrees.
This memorandum is the first document in the government file on the founding of CUHK. No record of any reply from the government is in the file. There is little doubt, however, that the memorandum did have an impact on the government policy of relying on HKU alone to meet the growing demand for an expansion of university education. In an earlier memorandum dated 26 January 1956, dealing with the issue,
L. G. Morgan, Deputy Director of Education, focused his discussion entirely on the Keswick, and the Jennings and Logan's reports, and on how HKU could adjust to meet the demands. (L. G. Morgan, A Memorandum on Entry to the University of Hong Kong by Students from Chinese Secondary Schools, typescript, January 1956) In another memorandum dated October 1956, two months after Charles Long's submission, Morgan provided a much broader view of the issue. Five possible measures were proposed to meet the overall needs of the Chinese secondary school students. The first three items still focused on HKU and discussed how the University could open its door to the Chinese secondary school students. The fourth proposed item, however, broke new ground in suggesting "the development of four-year post-secondary colleges to award recognized diplomas or even degrees through HKU or an independent degree-granting authority." A more significant proposal as an alternative to the fourth proposal was "the establishment of a Chinese university with its own charter and degree-granting powers." This was the first time that the idea of a second university appeared in a government proposal. (A Further Memoran-dum on Chinese Matriculation and on the Provision of Facilities for Higher Education for Students from Chinese Middle Schools, type-script, October 1956) But the proposed item was followed by lengthy
quotations from the Keswick, and the Jennings and Logan's reports
against such an idea. Morgan's own recommendation still centred on
HKU, suggesting that the university should broaden its function and
accept a greater responsibility in meeting the community's needs.
Meanwhile, the three Colleges continued with their pursuit of de-�P
gree-awarding status. Bishop Hall took the lead in approaching the
government to arrange a meeting with representatives of the College to
discuss the issues brought up in Charles Long's memorandum. The
meeting was held on 18 January 1957. It brought, for the first time, an
opportunity for direct dialogue between the government, which was
represented by Crozier, Morgan and C. L. Chien, and heads of the three
Colleges, Ch'ien Mu (New Asia), Lin Dao-yang (Chung Chi) and F. I.
Tseung (United). Bishop Hall and Charles Long were also invited to
attend. Although the meeting ended without any decision, the govern-
ment came to learn directly of the work, if not the achievement of the
Colleges, their situations and difficulties. In the meeting, they also
exchanged ideas concerning the relationship of the Colleges with
government, the community and HKU. Ch'ien Mu even mentioned that
it would be preferable to establish a Chinese university on parallel lines
to HKU. But the point was not further discussed.
The meeting was followed by the establishment of the Chinese
Colleges Joint Council in February 1957 which marked another impor-
tant step on the road to the founding of The Chinese University. F. I.
Tseung, President of United College, was the chairman. His immediate
action was to send a proposal to the government in May for the estab-
lishment of two organizations crucial for the development of the
Colleges. The first would be an academic board composed of repre-
sentatives of the Colleges and the government to set standards and to
secure uniform examinations for admission as well as for graduation.
The other would be a general authority appointed by the government
and based on the pattern of the British University Grants Committee to
be responsible for the determination of the financial needs of the Col-
leges and the allocation of financial assistance from the government and
other sources. This proposal, though short, was decisive in having the
government directly involved in the development of the private colleges
which would lead to the establishment of a new institution with a status . equal to that of HKU. Crozier did not give any formal reply to the proposal but promised
to discuss the matter with Sir Christopher Cox, Education Adviser to the Secretary of State for the Colonies, who was the top decision-maker for major educational development in Hong Kong. This was an important step on the part of the Hong Kong government towards a move to a new direction for higher education in Hong Kong. The underlying factor for this move can perhaps be traced back to the Keswick Report which laid down the principle that university education in Hong Kong should cater for the needs of the society. By the mid-1950s, new needs which arose from the soc:;ial, educational, economic and political situations of the territory had become evident and were even pressing. Some response to the request and proposal for new developments seemed unavoidable.
In 1956, the population of Hong Kong had reached 2.6 million. Among the early immigrants, some had migrated to other places, while those who stayed had become' assimilated into Hong Kong society. They were, in the words of the government, "accepted residents of Hong Kong." The earlier view that the colleges set up by the refugee scholars were but transitional could no longer be maintained. In 1957, Crozier had this to say: "The colleges will remain in Hong Kong and will form a permanent part of its educational structure." (Crozier's report to Sir Christopher Cox, typescript, 26 May 1957) More and more students from the local Chinese middle schools were seeking admission into these colleges. In a government survey made in 1956,)ocal students accounted for about 88% of the total enrolment in these colleges, while the rest were students from Southeast Asian countries. In 1957, the secondary school population had increased to 58,000 and 4,800 sat for the School Leaving Certificate Examination in the same year. A total of 1,800 matriculated students applied for admission into HKU and only 316 were accepted, including only a very few from the Chinese secon-dary schools. Among the large number of aspirants for higher education, about a thousand had . to leave Hong Kong to seek admission into
' .
universities in Taiwan, China or abroad. There was good cause for concern over this brain drain.
Hong Kong in the 1950s was undergoing unprecedented changes in its economic development, moving from traditional entrepot trade into the new direction of industrial manufacturing and the export of local products. Newly established industries and the expansion of export markets all created the need for well-trained personnel in management,
marketing and commerce. At the same time, on account of the rapid
population increase and social transformation, there was great expan-
sion in education and other public services such as housing and welfare.
All these had to be dealt with by professionals, technical staff as well as
administrators. Therefore, the "brain drain" naturally exacerbated the
difficulties and raised obstacles to the development of Hong Kong. The
government could not just sit back and ignore the situation.
Schools in Hong Kong had always maintained a two-tier system of
Chinese and English. Since the establishment of HKU in 1911, English
education was able to have a complete education system from the
primaryto the tertiary levels. But the Chinese school system ended at
middle school. Before 1949 this did not bring discontent,. because the
school systems and curricula of mainland universities were connected
with the Hong Kong middle schools, thus providing places for Chinese
middle school graduates to further their education. But after the change
of government in China, Hong Kong students were unable to go back
there for their studies. Thus the Chinese education system lost its
university component, and resulted in an imbalance in the. two-tier
system. In addition, most of the financial support for the reconstruction
and development of HKU after the war came from the Hong Kong
Government Treasury. But the private colleges, playing important roles
in post-secondary education, received little or no help from the govern-
ment. In 1956, Morgan made this observation: "They [The Chinese
middle schools] cannot but feel a grievance at the present position
whereby governmentLprovides $8 million per annum as subvention to-
the University of Hong Kong which caters for the products of the
Anglo-Chinese schools, and makes little or no provision for university
courses which will cater for the products of the Chinese secondary
schools." (Morgan's Memorandum, January 1956)
The discontent brought about by this imbalanced system, whether culturally or politically, could bring conflict and instability to the com-munity. In October of 1956, unprecedented bloody riots caused by confrontations between pro-Taiwanese and pro-mainland political groups in Hong Kong shocked everybody. It reminded people of the presence of opposing elements in their society, and the possible turmoil . that could be triggered by quite accidental occurrences. The incident must have had a certain influence on the Hong Kong government ;:when it dealt with the existing problems in its education system. This
observation was recorded in a 1957 report: "The denial of fuller status to the post-secondary colleges might in time evoke strong national and political feelings that would create a serious issue." (Confidential report on the post-secondary colleges of Hong Kong presented to Christopher Cox from D. J. S. Crozier, typescript, 26 May 1957)
Indeed,the private colleges had by 1957 gone through almost ten years of struggle, and their achievements and contributions to society had won the appreciation of many, The fact that the three Colleges had received support from people in Hong Kong and foreign educational organizations was not accidental. In his 1957 investigation report on post-secondary colleges, C. L. Chien specifically pointed out, "They [the private post-secondary colleges] are making a valuable contribution to the cultural, social and economic life of the colony." (C. L. Chien, Report on Hong Kong Private Chinese Post-Secondary Institutes, typescript, 24 May 1957) The lack of university places for students meant that the talents needed by society were being drained away to other places, but the colleges were providing another venue for students to pursue higher education, and to remain living and working in Hong Kong. The three Colleges had in 1958 a total enrolment of more than 1,200 students with 517 in Chung Chi, 456 in New Asia and 248 in United College. The courses developed emphasized Chinese literature, history and business management. They also offered courses not avail-able in HKU, such as fine arts, sociology, accounting and_banldng. The colleges helped to produce school teachers, administrators and business management personnel who were generally needed in Hong Kong at that time. The contributions they made to the educational and economic developments could not be ignored.
At the same time, among the scholars who came from mainland China were experts in various fields of Chinese studies. Through the courses developed in the colleges, public lectures delivered and articles published, they were able to spread an unprecedentedly rich Chinese cultural atmosphere in this British-governed territory. In addition, be-cause of the turr�goil inside China, many foreign scholars interested in Chinese studies chose to come to Hong Kong to conduct their academic researches and studies. The private colleges were able to assist and assume an important role in this capacity.
. Christopher Cox, who had been the Education Adviser to the Secretary of State for the Colonies since 1945, was familiar with the
The Founding
development of higher education in Hong Kong. He was Chairman of the Committee appointed to consider the re-opening of HKU after the war, and had long served as adviser on the development of higher education in British territories in Asia. In his visit to Hong Kongin April of 1957, Cox first met with the representatives of the private colleges, to gain an understanding of their situation and requests. He then met separately with Bishop Hall and Dr Lindsay Ride, the Vice-Chancellor of HKU and with two representations from the most concerned faculties at the University, Professor F. S. Drake of the Department of Chinese and Professor K. E. Priestley of the Department of Education. Cox then left for Singapore to visit Nanyang University. All these contacts were helpful in his study of the Joint Council's proposals and requests to the Hong Kong government. With the diminishing influence of Britain in Asia following the post-war decolonization, and the great changes in China, interest in higher education became oriented towards Hong Kong. The changing orientation was reinforced by the social and economic changes in the territory. The task undertaken by the Chinese colleges since 1949, and the positions they had established, made Cox realize that Britain's traditional colonial university education policy could no longer be upheld. His visit to Nanyang University, established in Singapore by local Chinese, enabled him to see the turmoil caused by the university in Singapore. He therefore concluded that the proposals and requests raised by the Joint Council should be given serious con-sideration. Cox returned to Britain in late 1957, first discussing the proposals. with several academic advisers in Britain, and then bringing up the issue for discussion at a meeting of the Executive Committee of the British Inter-University Council for Higher Education Overseas (Inter-University Council for short). Those in the meeting included the new Chairman of the Committee, Sir Charles Morris and the former Chairman, Sir Alexander Carr-Saunders. Morris was then the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Leeds, while Carr-Saunders since 1943 had been a member of the British Parliamentary Special Committee on University Development, and had been the Chairman of the Inter-University Council for many years, dealing with problems on education in various British territories. Matter for the establishment of a new university in Hong Kong was thus brought up for discussion among the authorities concerned in Britain.
From the point of view�P of the British government and British
university authorities, the question of whether to accept the proposal of the Joint Council to establish a second university in Hong Kong, com-posed of private colleges, that would use Chinese as the main medium of instruction, involved very important issues relating to education policy and academic standards. This would also be the first case dealt with by the Inter-University Council in the establishment of a university using a language other than English as the primary medium of instruc-tion.
After almost ten months, during which numerous meetings and discussions were held between Cox, Morris and Carr-Saunders repre-senting the British side, and Morgan and Crozier representing Hong Kong, it was finally decided in August 1958 that another university would be established in Hong Kong, and it would be the apex of Chinese education under the two-tier education systems in English and Chinese.
In their meetings, Cox, Morris and others were most concerned with student quality, teacher qualifications, curriculum, facilities and the administrative system of the Colleges, as this was the first time that the Inter-University Council would be dealing with the establishment of a non-English speaking university. After careful discussion and planning, they laid down some very cautious steps to guarantee that the Colleges would attain university standards in every way. The plan suggested that the government should first pass an ordinance confirming the status of the Colleges as institutes of higher education, thereby removing them from the control of the Hong Kong Education Ordinance. At the same time, the government would invite experts to draw up guidelines for development in basic conditions so that governmental financial assis-tance could be extended to the Colleges according to their needs, ena-bling them to attain the required standards. Secondly, the government would appoint an Advisory Committee to be composed of international scholars who would conduct a final review. The government would then pass the required ordinance for the establishment of the new university.
The plan was first approved by the Governor in conjunction with the Legislative Council, followed by the appropriation of necessary fund-ing. It then immediately received the official consent of the British government and the Inter-University Council. In May of 1959, the Chinese Colleges Joint Council on behalf of the three Colleges, ac-cepted the government's suggested plan. On 2 June 1959, the Hong Kong government officially announced that it was prepared to establish
The Founding
a new university with Chinese as the main medium of instruction. The plan was to start with the funding of the development of the three Colleges, United, Chung Chi and New Asia.
5. Establishment of the University, 1959-1963
The years between the government's announcement in June 1959 of the plan to set up a new university, and its inception in October 1963 were crucial in the formation of the structure, character and academic quality of the University. Development in these years also laid the foundation for the University's relationship with the government, the Hong Kong society and the international academic community.
The important role of John Fulton, as Chairman of the Fulton Commission of 1963, in the birth of the University is generally known. Less well-known�P perhaps is the crucial part which he played in 1959 as adviser to the Governor, Sir Robert Black, making recommendations for the development and improvement of the Colleges in preparation for university status. The report, entitled The Development of Post-Secondary Colleges in Hong Kong was submitted to the Governor in March 1960 and was accepted as a blueprint for the future university. Among other details, its recommendation for a federal organization, its stress on "academic freedom," "university autonomy," research, and bi-cultural mission were especially important in shaping the basic character of the University.
The prime moving force for the development of the colleges during this period was, however, the government, particularly in terms oflegal enactments, financial allocations and administrative support. It began with the passage of the Post-Secondary College Ordinance (May 1960) which freed the colleges from the restrictions of the Education Ordinance. This was followed by a series of bills and regulations which culminated in the formal establishment of the University by The Chinese University Ordinance of 1963. Related matters were discussed in the Legislative Council and the policies formulated received enthusiastic support from the council members. Financial appropria-tions were adequate, if not generous. Under the Post-Secondary Colleges Grants Regulations (1960, 1961), salary scales and teacher-student ratios were gradually improved and, at the establishment of the
University, became parallel with those in the University of Hong Kong.
L. G. Morgan, who had been the Deputy Director of Education in charge of the private post-secondary colleges since 1952, was appointed ad-viser to the Chinese Colleges Joint Council and the government, serving as liaison between the Colonial Office, the Inter-University Council, the Hong Kong government and the Joint Council. It is worth noting that in the course of the formulating of policies and regulations, appointing of personnel and making appropriation for expenses, the government adopted a very liberal attitude. This may be attributable in part to the change of educational policy within the Commonwealth in the late 1950s for more independent regional development. More direct in its influence was Fulton's report of March 1960, which had been adopted as the blueprint for the establishment of the University. The report, with an emphasis that "autonomy is an essential attitude of a university in the pursuit of its proper aims," was well received by the Governor, Sir Robert Black, a firm believer in academic self-determination and "cooperation through understanding and mutual respect."
The international character of the Colleges was strengthened during this stage of development. With their roots in China and early associa-tion with the American educational foundations and universities, British experience and connections were relatively lacking. British influence was reinforced, however, by the very fact that the official support came at this stage from British sources -the British home goyernment, the Hong Kong government, the British Inter-University Council and locally, the British Council and HKU. John Fulton himself in fact brought with him the experience of three different British universities: Oxford, Wales and Sussex. Introduction and exchange of ideas concern-ing the system, curriculum, teaching methods, etc. in the British univer-sities were facilitated by the British Council and HKU in a series of open forums and conferences held in 1960 and 1961. Participants in-cluded faculties and administrators from a number of leading British universities. In October 1960, through the arrangement of the Inter-University Council, Presidents of the three Colleges were invited for a three-month visit to more than seventeen universities in Britain. Similar arrangements were made for a visit by the Colleges' Registrars the following year. In 1961, when experts were invited to visit Hong Kong to advise the three Colleges on the development of their courses in arts, science, economics and business administration, and also on library
facilities, three of them were from Britain and one from the United States.
Meanwhile, cooperation among the Colleges continued under the aegis of the Joint Council, particularly in matters concerning improve-ment and establishment of common standards in admission, teaching, graduation and faculty qualifications. A Joint Entrance Examination had been conducted since the establishment of the Joint Council in 1957. In 1959, with administrative support from the government Education Department, the Joint Council set up three boards responsible separately for the entrance examination, diploma examination and staff estab-lishment. The committees were composed of representatives from the three Colleges, administrative staff from the Education Department and academics from HKU. The work of the Joint Diploma Board could perhaps best illustrate progress achieved in raising the academic stand-ards of the students. The Board .as chaired by Professor Y. C. Wong of the Mathematics Department of HKU. Panels of examiners for each subject were composed of internal examiners from the Colleges and external examiners from HKU as well as overseas universities. The first Joint Diploma Examination was held in 1960, and by 1963, a total of four examinations had been held. Professor Wong's reports on the examinations indicated that as the number of examination papers in-creased and the .standards were raised year by year, the pass rate went up from 78% in 1961 to 95% in 1963. It was evident that the quality of both students and teaching was improving and meeting the higher standards required.
While the three Colleges collaborated to institute common academic standards and a uniform system of staff establishment, inter-nally the individual colleges developed under different conditions. Chung Chi and New Asia which had moved into their new campuses early in 1956, continued to receive support from their original sponsors, and were able to develop in more favourable conditions with the intro-duction of the government grant in 1959. Chung Chi had been the first among the three Colleges to establish a Science Faculty in 1957 and had the largest enrolment of science students. C. T. Yung, who in 1960 succeeded Lin Dao-yang as President, was a biologist who had taught at
_ Lingnan University and HKU, and was an experienced university ad-. ministrator. By 1963, the College had ten departments, a student enrol-
,\-ment of five hundred and around fifty teaching staff. New Asia under
the direction of its founding President, Ch'ien Mu, continued to strengthen its curriculum, setting up a Science Faculty in 1960 and expanding the Departments of Chinese Literature, History, English Literature, Fine Arts, Philosophy and Sociology. By 1963, the College had a total of twelve departments, with over four-hundred students and about forty full-time teachers.
With a shorter history and very limited support from international foundations, United College encountered greater difficulties at this stage of development. Its first President, F. I. Tseung who had led the Joint Council in 1956-1959 in striving for due recognition from the government, resigned shortly after succeeding in winning the government's acceptance in 1959. The position of United College was further weakened by the small student enrolment; the majority of its original students attended the evening sessions and had difficulty in gaining full-time student status. In 1960, United College students num-bered fewer than a hundred. The College did, however, enjoy close ties with the local community and was thus able to secure some supportfor its development from concerned Chinese community leaders. In 1960, Sir Sik-nin Chau, senior member of the Legislative Council and a member of the Executive Council, was invited to be Chairman of the Board of Trustees. The government also extended help by providing administrative support. Two senior officers of the Hong Kong Educa-tion Department were seconded to the College to assume the posts of Vice-President and Registrar, thus strengthening its administrative system.
More important change began in 1962, when the College succeeded in securing from the government the campus at Bonham Road. In the same year, Sir Ping-fan Fung assumed Chairmanship of the Board of Trustees and T. C. Cheng was appointed President of the College. Cheng was then one of the very few high-ranking Chinese officers who had held various important positions in the Hong Kong government. He had extensive knowledge of, as well as wide experience in dealing with education in Hong Kong.
T. C. Cheng's success in launching a fund-raising campaign with donations from the public not only helped put the College on a more favourable financial footing, it also strengthened the College's links with society at large. At the same time, closer relations with other local and overseas academic institutions were established through exchange
of academic visits and publications. The recruitment of young and
well-qualified staff and the introduction of a number of courses catering
for the needs of Hong Kong were also significant in the development
and strengthening of the College. By 1963, the College had nine depart-
ments distributed among the faculties of arts, science and commerce.
Student enrolment had increased to about 200 and the number of full-
time faculty staff had reached more than twenty. T. C. Cheng, as the
newly installed President of the College, had this comment on the
situation: "Because of our youth and physical smallness, we are in a
favourable position to develop and expand along new lines." (United
Bulletin, No. 8, December 1963, p. 18)
In preparing for the essential task of appointing a commission of
international scholars to make recommendations for the establishment
of the new university, a search for suitable candidates started in early
1961. The search work, led by Christopher Cox and the Inter-University
Council, took more than a year. Appointment of the commission was
announced in June 1962. It was important that the commission was
headed by John Fulton who had been invited to Hong Kong in 1959 and
was responsible for writing the report of 1960 which had served as the
blueprint for the future university. The other members of the commis-
sion were Choh-ming Li, Professor of Business Administration and
Director of the Centre for Chinese Studies at the University of Califor-
nia; J.V. Loach, Registrar of the University of Leeds; Thong Saw-pak,
Professor of Physics at the University of Malaya; and F. G. Young,
Professor of Biochemistry at the University of Cambridge. Professor Li,
who had served in various national universities in China before joining
the University of California in 1951, was familiar with the Chinese
university traditions as well as tertiary education in the United States.
Professor Thong, also of Chinese descent, had knowledge of the work-
ings of a British university system in an Asian society. Thus the com-
position of the commission itself was both strongly intern_ational and
Chinese, reflecting the aspirations of the planned university. During
their visit to Hong Kong in the -summer of 1962, members of the
commission had extensive contact, not only with people concerned with
higher education in Hong Kong, but with representatives from different _ sectors of the community as well. Before departing from Hong Kong on 15 August 1963, Fulton \publicly announced the recommendations of the commission for the
organization of the three Colleges into a new university. The recom-mendations met with a favourable response from society at large. In fact, since the government's announcement in June 1959 of its intent to set up a second university in Hong Kong, the general public had been enthusiastic in voicing their support in newspapers, journals, over the radio, and even in public forums, expressing their different views and suggestions about the future university. There was a consensus that the university should be established without delay.
The report of the commission was published in April 1963. It formally recommended the establishment in Hong Kong of a federal university, with Chung Chi, New Asia and United as the Foundation Colleges. The report, containing details on the organization, constitu-tion, staff establishment and other aspects of the proposed university, was accepted by the government in June of the same year.
Steps taken to prepare for the establishment of the university began as early as June 1961. While the government took the lead in the implementation of the scheme, particularly in budgeting, financial ap-propriation and legal enactment, a number of prominent leaders of the community also participated in the essential work of preparation. The work began with the formation of a Preparatory Committee, appointed to advise on a campus site and the formulation of a construction programme for the buildings required. The Committee was composed of fourteen members, the majority of whom were heads of the institu-tions (the three Colleges and HKU) and government departments (Education, Public Works, Chinese Affairs and the Colonial Secretariat) directly involved in the physical planning and building schemes of the future university. The two members from the local community were Mr Lee Iu-cheung, a prominent businessman, and the Hon. Cho-yiu Kwan, a solicitor and an unofficial member of both the Executive and the Legislative Councils. C. Y. Kwan was appointed Chairman of the Com-mittee.
Considering it desirable, even necessary, to have the University headquarters and the Colleges located in close proximity to each other, the Committee selected and secured from the government a promise to grant a plot of 250 acres of land in the upper Shatin Valley. The committee also set up accommodation schedules for the building of the University headquarters, New Asia College and. United College. Although a new site at Ma Liu Shui was chosen later, the fact that the
government agreed to allot an extensive site and accepted the proposal to keep the University headquarters and the Colleges on the same campus was undoubtedly a result of the foresight and the work of the Preparatory Committee.
Following the government's announcement of the acceptance of the Fulton Report, a Provisional Council was formed to proceed with the preparation. The Council was composed of twenty members, among whom were only two government officials: P. Donohue (Director of
Education) and J.E. McDouaU (Secretary for Chinese Affairs). Other members included Ch'ien Mu (President of New Asia), C. T. Yung (President of Chung Chi), T. C. Cheng (President of United College) and Lindsay Ride (Vice-Chancellor of HKU). The remaining fourteen members were all prominent leaders from the community, chosen from the academic, professional and business circles. Composition of the Council reflected not only the nature of the governing body of the University but also its close relationship with the Hong Kong com-munity. After the founding of the University, most of these members continued to be its supporters and benefactors, as University Council members or in other capacities.
C. Y. Kwan was again appointed Chairman, and the Hon. R. C. Lee, Vice-Chairman, of the Provisional Council. In spite of the fact that members of the Council in their own professions and positions were very busy people, much. of the important work of the Council was completed within a relatively short time. Naming the University was the first important responsibility. Given the enthusiastic support for the idea of a new university, many possible names were suggested by the public, and the question generated much discussion in the local press. There were suggestions based on geographical considerations such as "Kowloon," "Shatin," or "Hua Nan," meaning "South China." Another group felt the name should reflect the cultural heritage and connections of the University, e.g. "Chung Wah," meaning "of China" or "Wah Ying," meaning "of China and Britain." "Yat Sen," name of the founder of the Chinese Republic and a most respected Chinese historical figure, was also a popular suggestion. In spite of all these numerous sugges-tions and justifications, the Council was prompt in making the decision. The name of "The Chinese University of Hong Kong" was adopted. The
. rationale was that this name best conveyed the University's Hong Kong \�P�P connection and cultural heritage. True to its name, the University has
since its inception been dedicated to serving the needs of Hong Kong and to contributing to the enrichment of Chinese culture. The choice of a new campus site at Ma Liu Shui was another important accomplishment of the Council. Through the great efforts of
C.Y. Kwan, the Council was able to secure from the government the promise of a grant of land adjacent to Chung Chi College at Ma Liu Shui, an extensive and magnificent site for the University headquarters, United College, and New Asia. The choice had considerable impact on the future development of the University as the new site not only allowed the constituent parts of the University to be accommodated on the same campus, an extensive area of over 300 acres, but also provided ample space for future expansion.
Other essential work of the Council included the appointment of Szeto Wai as the architect for the university buildings, the completion of an establishment plan to meet initial staff needs, the review and accep-tance of the proposed constitution and the implementation of other recommendations of the Fulton Report. Nine of the members of the Council were at the same time appointed to the Selection Committee, chaired also by C.Y. Kwan, to advise the government on the selection of a Vice-Chancellor for the University. The amount of work, as described by Kwan, was "enormous." That the work of the Council could be completed so quickly and smoothly was attributed to the efforts of "hard-working colleagues," help from government departments, assis-
. tance from HKU, and above all, the unfailing support of the Governor, Sir Robert Black. This was publicly acknowledged in the address by
C.Y. Kwan at the inauguration of the University, "Despite the multi-tudinous problems weighing on his mind, His Excellency has given much time, thought and effort to forwarding the establishment of this University." (United Bulletin, No. 8, December 1963, p. 3)
The Chinese University of Hong Kong Ordinance, together with its Statutes, was passed in the Legislative Council and came into effect in September 1963. On 17 October 1963, the Governor, in his capacity as Chancellor, officiated at the inauguration ceremony of the University. The inauguration marked the beginning of a new era for higher educa-tion in Hong Kong as well as for the Foundation Colleges. It was, in the words of Sir Robert, "the consummation of hopes and dreams and plans." (Address by the Chancellor, "Inauguration of The Chinese University of Hong Kong," ibid., p. 1)
SLJmmary Remarks
Amidst difficulties and strains, The Chinese University was founded with the efforts of refugee scholars from different parts of China and the support of educationists, academics, government officials and eminent individuals from Hong Kong, Britain and the United States. The result was a new university built with diverse resources from both China and the West. The University drew basically on the strengths of the Colleges representing divergent streams of Chinese education -national univer-sities, with the fine qualities of Confucianism; Christian universities enjoying close contacts with Western cultures; and locally-oriented private universities with their pragmatic and eclectic outlooks. Yet it was also infused with a strong international character, not only because of the Hong Kong-British setting, but also because many scholars, educational missions, foundations, and institutions from abroad had helped in many ways in the development of the Colleges towards university status.
Committed to the development and enrichment of Chinese culture, and to the integration of Chinese and Western knowledge, CUHK was established with a firm foundation able to face the challenge of meeting the needs of the cross-cultural and dynamic society of Hong Kong. The very process of founding the University, of overcoming obstacles and solving problems along the way, contributed to the creation of a univer-sity with a reservoir of experience, with the strength and the ability to face the challenges of the future with confidence, and with a passionate commitment to continuing its quest for excellence and to making a contribution to the international academic community in a new age marked by a veritable explosion of knowledge.
2
A New Society, New Knowledge, and a New University
Bernard Hungkay LUK
University Campus looking towards the Tolo Channel, 1993
Background: Campus site in 1968
The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) is a university which belongs to Hong Kong, and which uses Chinese as the principal lan-guage of instruction. During the past three decades, Hong Kong society, the Chinese language, and universities all over the world have all experienced very significant changes. Many of these changes have been closely connected to the growth of CUHK.
Hong Kong is an immigrant society. In the 1950s, when the colleges which later became the Foundation Colleges of CUHK were first estab-lished, a majority of the population of Hong Kong was refugees from the turbulence of civil war and revolution in China. They brought with them the values, knowledge, and skills of Chinese scholars, peasants, artisans, and merchants, as well as the languages and folk traditions of north and south China, especially of the Guangdong rural hinterland. The postwar history of Hong Kong is the story of the efforts of these refugees and their offspring, together with those of the earlier settlers, to build a new industrial city. People from diverse backgrounds learnt from one another in their daily work and recreation. They assimilated many of the values, knowledge, skills, and practices of Western in-dustrial civilization. And they created an indigenous culture and a distinct society. The emergence of CUHK has been part and parcel of the evolution of Hong Kong from a collection of demoralized and hardpressed migrants to a free, vibrant, vigorous, and distinct society. The University has been one of the more dynamic manifestations of that evolution.
The Chinese language has a longer continuous history than any other language in the world, but it has been undergoing a radical trans-formation in this century. Early in the century, the "vernacular" lan-guage replaced the "classical" as the principal mode of written expression; and during the past four decades,�P there have been multi-dimensional developments in vocabulary, sentence. patterns, rhetoric, and forms of discourse. The Chinese language nowadays is a much richer and more potent medium than what it was in mid-century. Spe-cialized as well as popular vocabularies and conventions in Chinese have come into existence for all kinds of activities of the modern world. Chinese and other traditional ideas and customs, as well as modem economic, social, political, cultural, religious, academic, scientific, and technological activities, can all be conveyed precisely and directly in contemporary Chinese. These new vocabularies and conventions enjoy
wide circulation in print or electronic media, as well as in person-to-person communication.
Hong Kong is located at the crossroads of Asian and Western cultures and languages, and has itself undergone rapid modernization, in language no less than in other aspects of life. CUHK, being one of the major Chinese-language institutions of Hong Kong, has been both con-tributor and beneficiary in the expansion of the ranges of discourse and functions of the language. In recent decades, the continued evolution of Chinese as a world language has taken place in the form of parallel developments in Hong Kong, China, and Taiwan, with a great deal of autonomy and mutual borrowing among the three centres. CUHK is a nodal point in this development.
The institution of the university originated in Europe in the Middle Ages. Nineteenth-century reforms introduced modern academic dis-ciplines and practices of instruction, evaluation, and administration. The reformed institution was transplanted to Chinese society in the early twentieth century. Before the Second World War, the main function of universities in most societies was to prepare the sons of small social elites for leadership. positions in government and culture. This elitist higher education became democratized in many societies, especially in the West, after the war, when much higher levels of technology and social equality were deemed desirable. Systems of higher educa-tion were expanded rapidly to produce large supplies of professionals, adminstrators, researchers, and intellectuals as well as to promote upward social mobility for capable young men and women from the lower socio-economic strata. Hong Kong higher education has not followed the Western trend; but it has completely re-defined elitist education, from an elitism of social reproduction, to one of meritocracy. This re-definition transformed the relationship between. university and society. CUHK has been a leading edge in this transfor-mation.
A Systems Approach
The evolutions of Hong Kong, the Chinese language, and universities
.
h,ave all been manifested in the growth of CUHK over the decades. That
growth itself could be described most conveniently by using a systems approach.
The functioning and development of an educational system or a school could be discussed in terms of its input, operations, output, and feedback. A school is a part of its society. It derives its resources from society to sustain its processes of teaching and learning. The input of resources which a school receives from society include the following: values, knowledge, and skills possessed by members of society; the workforce of teachers and students; financial and other forms of material wealth supplied from government and private coffers, and so on. With these resources, the school operates: to determine the structure and contents of its curriculum; to instruct and to evaluate the results of instruction; to research; to acquire and make use of various kinds of facilities for its purposes, and so forth. The operations of the school generate output which it renders to society. The most important output of course are the graduates. Equipped with new values, knowledge, and skills, the graduates can work more effectively for the economic, social, political, and cultural betterment of society. The school also propagates values, knowledge and skills through its publications, broadcasts, open forums, and extramural courses. The output accrues to the human and material resources of society as a whole. Some of that accrual will result in a greater feedback of input into the educational institution at a later time, enabling it to increase its operations and output.
Over the past four decades, the constituent Colleges and CUHK have derived very considerable inputs from Hong Kong society and from the international academic community. These include modern-izing values and progressively updated knowledge and skills; larger and larger numbers of teachers and students with ever-broadening social compositions; and ever-increasing financial and material goods. The operations of the University and its Colleges have also become more modem and complex. Graduates, publications, and other services produced by the University have matched the development needs of Hong Kong society, both in quality and in quantity. Together with its society, the University has progressed towards both indigenization and internationalization.
In this chapter, the four-decade story of the Colleges and of the University formed out of their federation, will be told in terms of input, operations, and output.
The Inputs
Values
Values are imbued in a school by people, and by books. The values
brought into CUHK from its social milieu have come from the beliefs,
ideals and aspirations of the teachers, administrators, and students, and
from what they have read.
The colleges which became the Foundation Colleges of CUHK
were established by "refugee scholars" who moved to Hong Kong from
China in the late 1940s. They chose to come to Hong Kong to continue
their academic and educational careers, because their ideas, beliefs, or
academic specialties were not deemed acceptable by either of the two
great dictatorship parties of China. Some of them were Confucian
scholars, followers of Confucius, Mencius, Lu Xiangshan, and Wang
Y angming. Some s_ubscribed to the ideas of the May Fourth Movement
and insisted on science and democracy. Some were Christians, believ-
ing in the teachings of Jesus and of the churches. Some were social
scientists, practised in the use of the perspectives and methods of their
Western-derived academic disciplines in the analysis of problems. The
refugee scholars were by no means unified in their beliefs, ideas, or
specialties; but they did have certain common experiences:
Our hands empty of worldly goods;
Our journeys long, with no end in sight;
Separated from kin and hearth, adrift;
Our bodies starved, our spirit wearied.
Through dangers and hardship, on we struggle.
Deprivation calls forth our deepest feelings ....
(From the New Asia College anthem)
Scholars of diverse persuasions and many different institutions,
from different parts of China, converged on Hong Kong, to breathe
the air of freedom. In time, they formed themselves into groups by
affinity of beliefs, and laboured to set up different colleges, in order to
carry on the academic and educational work which they had left behind
in China. New Asia College was founded in 1949, Chung Chi College , in 1951, and United College in 1956. Each college subscribed to a different set of values which they were committed to pass on to their <students.
When CUHK was first established as a federation of these three Colleges in 1963, thes. characteristic values remained to distinguish one college from another. However, after "the hills were opened up and the land cleared" at Shatin (in the words of the CUHK Students Union song), to build the new university campus, and all the colleges moved in and held classes together, the values of each college became less its own preserve and more its contribution to a common pool. This confluence of convictions was related to the re-organization of CUHK from a federal to a unitary structure in 1977. It was also related to the emer-gence of the new local-born or local-raised generation in Hong Kong society. From the point of view of the founding spirit of a college, this was no doubt a regrettable fading out of old values. But from another perspective, this was a significant instance of how Hong Kong people have made use of divergent Chinese traditions to create an indigenous culture.
The Chinese University of Hong Kong derived its values not only from the founding ethos of its Colleges, but also from the many intellec-tual and academic traditions brought to its campus by Chinese scholars from Taiwan and overseas. CUHK has been insistent from its beginning that it is not a Chinese university, not a British university, not an American university, but an international university. But it is an interna-tional university teaching in Chinese, constituted largely of Chinese persons, and rooted in Hong Kong society where one can.enjoy freedom of thought and expression. As such, it has received the support of many overseas Chinese scholars. Many of these scholars brought to the University not only the values derived from their Chinese heritage, but also the moral and professional values of social and natural sciences from around the world. These values merged with the founding philosophies of the Colleges, and became manifested in the modes of thinking and the instructional practices on campus.
During the 1970s and early 1980s, Hong Kong society experienced a series of transformations. The economy developed from relying on labour intensive manufacturing to one based on higher value-added production and on professional services. Society became more modern-ized and de-colonialized, with corresponding changes in thought and culture. Locally formulated ideas coexisted with new intellectual trends from China and the West, including a variety of Marxist doctrines. Old and new ideas competed for attention in the free market of Hong Kong
and of CUHK, and the divergent values encountered in the University
provided creative stimuli and tensions.
Although Hong Kong is a British dependent territory, the role of
British culture at CUHK has not been particularly conspicuous. British
scholars, or Hong Kong scholars who had studied in Britain, have never
been numerous on the faculty, being far fewer than scholars with, say,
North American connections. Probably the most important values intro-
duced from Britain have been constitutional principles and pragmatic
conventions -the rule of law, rationalization of administration, sys-
tematization of financial management, institutional autonomy, and
freedom from government interference in university affairs. As for
values derived directly or indirectly from North America and found at
CUHK, these include: Protestant Christianity, liberalism, democratic
ideals, basic premises of social and natural sciences, pacifism,
feminism, Western Marxism; and so on. Obviously there are a great
many contradictions and incompatibilities among these values, and it is
by no means a simple matter to assess the influence of North American
ideas in the university.
Over the decades, the students of CUHK also brought to campus many of the values cherished by their parents. The large majority of the students, like the bulk of the people of Hong Kong, were not scions of the educated elite of China. Rather, they came from families of peasants, artisans, and merchants. What they received in their upbringing was not so much the scholarly tradition of the Confucian literati or of the modern Chinese intelligentsia, but the "little tradition" of the common people. The peasants, artisans, and merchants, of course, were not entirely insulated from. the literati/intelligentsia, but the two groups did have very different emphases in their values: the former were more preoc-cupied with the mundane needs of their lives of poverty, while the latter were proud to show concern for the problems of the country and the people. The values of the common people were, to be sure, more narrow and short-sighted, but they were also more pragmatic and firmly grounded. Commoner families expected their children to keep their feet on the ground, to work hard, efficiently and effectively, in the hope of achieving a stable livelihood, and being able to improve the living
.tandards of the family. Such values have been part of the basis for the economic success of Hong Kong and other overseas Chinese corn-. f11Unities during the past decades. The students brought these values
from their homes to the University, to contribute to the confluence that isCUHK.
Schools of thought from Chinese and Western traditions, constitu-tional conventions and administrative practices, and values from family education were brought into CUHK over two generations. Since there is no official dogma in either Hong Kong society or in the University, with which everyone has to "unite one's thinking," the May Fourth spirit of intellectual contention has survived uniquely in this university founded by scholars exiled from China.
During the early years of CUHK, the distinguishing values of each College were clearly detectable in its teachers, students, and operational styles. Thirty years later, the features of each have been merged into the new consensual values of Hong Kong society, and of the University. These consensual values have not yet received systematic articulation. But in general terms one could point to a high regard for freedom, the rule of law, family-centredness, love, social justice, rationality, knowledge, science, competition, efficiency, and pragmatic results. This general consensus was developed over the decades in the Univer-sity and in Hong Kong society. It brings together many Chinese and Western values in a distinctive local mix.
Knowledge and Skills
The input of knowledge and skills into CUHK has also undergone very considerable change since the early years of the Foundation Colleges, in line with the socio-econol1:ric development of Hong, Kong and .the knowledge explosion in the international academic community.
In the 1950s Hong Kong had just begun to develop the circulation of knowledge in society, including the Chinese and English languages, some mathematics, some traditional Chinese and Western scholarship in literature, history, philosophy, and religion. This knowledge was possessed by a small number of local scholars and a somewhat larger number of "refugee scholars." Knowledge and skills in social science, natural science, and modern technology existed only in small and iso-lated quantities; moreover, most of this knowledge was based on Western theories or assumptions which had never been tested in local studies or applications. All this traditional and modern knowledge had only very tenuous links with the economic and social functioning of
Hong Kong. As a matter of fact, the economy, based on exploitation of cheap labour in low-skilled manufacturing, could have but little to do with expert knowledge or tertiary-level learning. There were also the unexamined and unsystematized practices and skills of the commercial and industrial sectors, to which the academic community paid scant attention.
In the early years of CUHK, the industrial economy of Hong Kong was already firmly established. Export-led labour intensive manufactur-ing was still the mainstay of the community. Such industries did not require up-to-date technology. But the products did need to be more and more diversified, in order to find and maintain niches in the world market. At the same time, business management and market develop-ment were advancing beyond the crude daring of the first decade, and becoming more systematized, more strategic, and more modern. In the community, the demand for education, social welfare, financial management, and other professional services increased rapidly. CUHK responded to these demands by recruiting from overseas a number of social scientists and business scholars, to bring their specialties to the university. It also set up research institutes as well as social, economic, and mass communications research centres, under the direction of these overseas experts, to collect data on the society, economy, and business environment of Hong Kong, to test and verify imported theories, to train local students, and to work towards local scholarship in these areas.
By the 1970s, Hong Kong began to develop its own electronics industry. Service industries, such as financial and other economic ser-vices, information, social research, polling, mass media, management, computer services, social welfare, health, and education, also increased by leaps and bounds. Hong Kong became an increasingly diversified industrial civilization. CUHK again responded to these developments by recruiting the most advanced experts in electronics and other fields to impart their knowledge and skills.
By the early 1980s, the economy of Hong Kong had attained af-fluent levels. Life in the community took on a new aspect. The con-tagious diseases characteristic of poorer societies had come under control. The life expectancy of Hong Kong people was already among the highest in the world; the incidence of diseases and the leading causes of death were becoming similar to those of advanced industrial societies. The Faculty of Medicine at CUHK was established at this
time, and it put its emphasis on preventive care and medical research, bringing into Hong Kong the most advanced knowledge and skills in these fields. Since the late 1980s, Hong Kong has been moving towards "high tech" development. The University established its Faculty of Engineering and the Hong Kong Institute of Biotechnology, in order strategically to introduce state-of-the-art technology from overseas, and from local laboratories, to serve local needs.
Present-day Hong Kong has entered the p,ost-industrial age. Ser-vices have replaced manufacturing as the mainstay of the economy. Various learned professions have accumulated considerable local and international information and experience, and have begun to establish local standards and conventions. The amount of information that exists and circulates in the community-especially the knowledge of the social and natural sciences, trade and industry, and of various service professions, is many times richer when compared to what there was four decades ago. It is also much more cosmopolitan, and at the same time indigenized.
Hong Kong is a global centre for information; it is also the world centre for the Chinese-language book trade, and the Southeast Asian regional emporium for English-language publications. Local and over-seas talents of all kinds congregate here. Hong Kong has produced a number of leading scientists. Local works of literature, art, music, philosophy, history, and social science are being produced in increas-ing numbers. Such works often adopt a distinctly Hong Kong perspec-tive in their inquiries into Hong Kong, Chinese, Southeast Asian, or Western problems. Not a few of them attain international standards. Many of these products of local culture are input or feedback into CUHK, and become a significant part of the knowledge base of the University.
Just as values from divergent Chinese and Western sources con-verge at CUHK, so do knowledge and skills pertaining to various disciplines, originating from Hong Kong or from other lands, find acceptance at CUHK, giving rise to knowledge that is more and more international as well as indigenous. It is not an exaggeration to say that the de-colonization of Hong Kong education began when CUHK com-mitted itself from the first to be an international university, with its knowledge base founded on the international academic community as well as on local research. The academic achievement so far attained
in the University and in Hong Kong society is the fruit of that de-colonization.
Teachers
Recruiting and developing its own academic staff is the most important
means for a university to acquire knowledge. CUHK has experienced a
great deal of change in its teaching staff over the decades.
Each of the Foundation Colleges was set up with only a handful of
teachers, many of whom had to assume numerous teaching and ad-
ministrative tasks. By the time the Colleges federated themselves to
form CUHK, the University had a combined total of no more than a
hundred teaching and administrative personnel, responsible for over a
thousand students. During the past three decades, CUHK has continued
to expand its workforce by recruiting teachers for various disciplines, as
well as personnel for student services, instructional support, administra-
tive, clerical, and other work. In the early 1990s, CUHK has a total
workforce of more than two thousand, including some seven hundred
full-time teachers.
The sustained increase in the number of teachers over the decades
has been due to the continued expansion of enrolment of the University,
as well as the economic miracle of Hong Kong which has provided the
means for such an increase. Where a particular talent is in short supply
locally, the University can recruit from overseas, offering competitive
salaries. In this way, the University has been able to maintain good
teach.r-student ratios and to offer an ever broader range of courses.
Apart from the multiple increases in teachers and courses, there have been very important changes�P also in the qualifications of the teachers. When the three Colleges were first established, almost all their teachers had been educated in China, and had taught in universities in China. Some among them also had studied abroad, and possessed ad-vanced degrees from universities overseas. There were also a few non-Chinese teachers, most of whom had been missionaries in China. Around the time of federation, the Colleges had additional staff who were graduates of the University of Hong Kong or of universities in .. Taiwan, and overseas Chinese and non-Chinese scholars. Since the 1970s, with the passage of time and the public policy of localization in ;Hong Kong, most newly appointed teachers have been products of the
Hong Kong school system, who have gone overseas after completing secondary or tertiary education, and returned with advanced degrees. Some of them also have had teaching experience in universities in other countries.
Although CUHK has never ceased to appoint overseas Chinese or non-Chinese scholars, Hong Kong scholars nevertheless form a large majority of the present academic staff, some 53% of whom had their first degrees or diplomas from a local tertiary level institution, and three-quarters completed their secondary education locally. On the other hand, although the University never made any rules against appointing its own graduates to teaching positions, only one-third of the academic staff possess qualifications awarded by the University or its Foundation Colleges; and even these teachers usually have had considerable academic experience in other institutions.
It is evident that CUHK has successfully avoided the "academic inbreeding" endemic to universities in China, which arose out of the habit of appointing favoured graduates to teach in their Alma Mater, and be promoted through the ranks. One of the mechanisms by which CUHK has been able to avoid inbreeding is its requirement, in prin-ciple, to appoint only holders of a doctorate to the position of lecturer. In the early 1990s, some 68% of the teachers have doctorates. This repre-sents a far larger number of doctorates than the University, or even all the institutions in Hong Kong together, could possibly supply. The academic staff nowadays consists of 27% with advanced degrees from Hong Kong institutions, 14% from British institutions, 50% from American, 11 % from Canadian, and smaller numbers with Taiwanese, Japanese, European, or other advanced degrees. Some teachers also hold advanced degrees from more than one country. This is another indication of the localization and internationalization of the University.
The gender ratio of the academic staff also has undergone change over the decades. The Foundation Colleges came into existence at a time when sex discrimination was still very blatant in Chinese society, and the educational opportunities for girls and women were very much restricted. Hence few women qualified to teach at the tertiary level, and only a miniscule number were on the College staffs. As Hong Kong society developed over two generations, and careers became open to talent, sexual inequalities in education have been greatly reduced, and the number of female teachers at CUHK gradually increased. Since it
takes many years after completion of secondary school to attain an advanced degree and be appointable to a lecturership, and many more years before promotion to the senior academic ranks, women still remain a small though very significant minority on the staff. In the early 1990s, women constitute 10% of the higher ranks of senior lecturers, readers, and professors, 16% of the lecturers, and 38% of the assistant lecturers, instructors, and equivalent or lower ranks. Altogether they are 17% of the staff; 46% of them hold a doctorate. This is roughly in line with the considerable, though incomplete, progress made by women in Hong Kong society over four decades.
Students
Students as well as teachers are the human resources which society invests in a university. Society allocates to higher education some of its members who are not required immediately for production, in the hope that they would become better educated and make greater contributions to its welfare later on. The more affluent the society, the more members it could afford to educate at a tertiary level. The greater the demand for a higher level workforce, the more students would need to be enrolled.
The three Colleges began with very few students. The Colleges, as well as Hong Kong society at that time, were poverty-stricken, Not many students could be supported by public or private means in tertiary education. By the late 1950s and 1960s, the industrial economy was quite firmly established, and somewhat more families could support their children through college, but they were still a tiny minority. Most families outside the small middle class experienced great difficulty even in sending their children to secondary school, and only about one-quarter of the age group did complete that stage, with boys far outnum-bering girls. A small portion of that one-quarter proceeded to matriculation and university courses.
At the time of federation in 1963, the three Colleges had a total enrolment of about 1200. In 1992, with economic growth, free and universal secondary education, government provision of student grants and loans, expansion of tertiary education, and social trends towards greater equality between classes and genders, the enrolment at CUHK is now over ten thousand. (This includes some part-time students; the "full-time equivalent" is 9200.) The enrolment has increased eight
times. During the same period, the university-age population of Hong Kong increased only twofold. The characteristics of the students also changed a great deal.
Most of the first students of the three Colleges had migrated to Hong Kong from China; many came with their teachers. This followed more than a decade of political upheavals in China, which greatly disrupted the schooling of many students, who consequently were more varied in age and experience. At the time of federation, most of the students had been born during the Japanese invasion or civil war years, the majority of them in China. Since the 1970s, almost all full-time undergraduates matriculated immediately or soon after completing secondary education in Hong Kong, and a larger and larger proportion of them were local born, with broadly homogeneous life experiences.
In the mid-1980s, the evening part-time degree programmes were introduced, recruiting older students who remained employed during the day. At the same time, the Graduate School expanded its enrolment, attracting both fresh graduates and mid-career students. A measure of heterogeneity re-entered the student population, although an over-whelming majority were still local students.
In terms of their secondary schooling, most of the local students recruited by the three Colleges during the 1950s had attended the Chinese-language stream of Hong Kong schools, while students from the English-language stream generally aimed for places in the English-speaking University of Hong Kong. One of the reasons for establishing CUHK was to provide opportunities of higher education for students of the Chinese stream in a local public-funded institution. However, since the 1960s, the proportion of the Chinese stream within Hong Kong secondary education rapidly declined; at the same time the Chinese and English streams gradually merged. The result is the new de facto mainstream of Anglo-Chinese secondary schools which function with a unique pattern of bilingualism. Most matriculants of CUHK since the late 1970s have come from these schools.
As for admission selection, the University administered its own matriculation examination to select applicants from among Senior Mid-dle Three (Chinese stream) or Form Six (English stream) (i.e., 12th grade) students. After the Hong Kong Examinations Authority was set up by statute, this examination was handed over to the Authority in 1979, which made it a public examination. It became known as the
Hong Kong Higher Level Examination, available to all Form Six-(12th
grade) students regardless of language stream. In the early 1980s, the
University introduced the Provisional Acceptance Scheme, whereby a
student who had achieved very good results in the Hong Kong Certifi-
cate of Education Examination (Form Five level [11 th grade]) could be
provisionally accepted, and would be formally matriculated after a year
of satisfactory study in a Form Six class, bypassing the intense competi-
tion of the Higher Level Examination.
In recent years, sixth form education in Hong Kong is being
simplified and rationalized. The Higher Level Examination has been
abolished, and a Joint Admissions Scheme, at the Form Seven level
(13th grade), is being introduced for all the public-funded tertiary in-
stitutions. At the same time, following the crisis of political confidence
that resulted from the Beijing massacre in 1989, the Hong Kong govern-
ment decided to double tertiary enrolment over the first half of the
1990s. These policy changes will no doubt create an entirely new
situation for student recruitment at CUHK. Be that as it may, it is
important to bear in mind that in its thirty-year history, the University
has always followed meritocratic principles, based mainly on examina-
tion results, in its admission exercises. There has never been any politi-
cal criteria of eligibility, or government intervention in the matriculation
process. Selection has always been within the authority and respon-
sibility of the academic staff.
The socio-economic background of students admitted to the University manifested two distinct phases, divided by the introduction of the government grants and loans scheme. During the 1950s and 1960s, Hong Kong tertiary-level students almost all came from middle-class or wealthier families, and their parents had much higher educa-tional attainments and income than the general population. They also enjoyed rather better standards of housing than the overcrowded tene-ment blocks common at that time. Their tuition fees and living expenses were usually paid for by their families. If they took part-time jobs to help finance their education or to earn pocket money, it would be in genteel work such as giving private lessons or teaching evening school. By the late 1960s, secondary education had become more widespread, and there was already an increasing number of students from poor . families. They were in full-time employment on top of studying full-'time, in order to support their parents and siblings while working their
way through university. Certainly not enough support was provided by the universities or society for these students.
In 1969, the Hong Kong government introduced the Student Grants and Loans Scheme, whereby students from low income families were guaranteed that if they were offered places in the local universities, they would receive enough financial support, through government grants and interest-free loans, to finish the course. The scheme ensured that stu-dents of merit from poor families would have the opportunity to go to university. It transformed the universities from being, in part, finishing schools of the socio-economic elite, into training grounds for an achievement-oriented, highly competitive, meritocratic elite. With this scheme, pupils in secondary school, without regard of social origins, were greatly encouraged to aim for higher destinations in their work lives; and the universities were enabled to recruit the best possible students. A very significant degree of social mobility was promoted, with far reaching results in breaking down class barriers and making Hong Kong a society of much more equal opportunities.
The Chinese University of Hong Kong played a vanguard role in this transformation. Within a few years after the first grants and loans were made, the first year students in the University predominantly came from working-class families in the public housing estates, with parents who had low incomes and low educational attainments. In fact, during the 1970s, the proportions of CUHK students representing the different social classes was almost identical with the corresponding proportions in the general population. The University was undoubtedly a most important avenue towards a more equal society, probably more so than the other tertiary institutions. Since the early 1980s, the percentage of students from middle-class backgrounds has increased somewhat, but the University has remained an important ladder for social mobility.
As for gender, at the time of federation, there were two men en-rolled to every woman. Opportunities for secondary education were not yet equal for boys and girls, and far more boys completed the course than girls. Parents, too, were more prepared to support their sons than their daughters in higher education. Over the decades, however, atten-dance in secondary schools has been equalized, and the participation of women in tertiary education has continued to expand. During the 1970s to early 1980s, the proportion of women among under-graduates at CUHK increased gradually from one-third to 40%. Since
the mid-l 980s, the pace has accelerated; and by the early 1990s, just over half of the undergraduates are women. On the other hand, Hong Kong senior secondary schools divide their pupils into arts and science streams, and most of the girls find themselves in the arts stream. Conse-quently, there are fewer women students than men in the Science, Engineering, and Medical Faculties at the University. Nevertheless, during the past three decades, the University has served as one of the most important avenues for Hong Kong women in their search for freedom and advancement in learning and in their careers.
Finance
Financial resources are another important input from society into the university. Operating a modem university is very expensive. To operate a fully equipped comprehensive university at international standards is even more expensive. Over the decades, the funding needed by CUHK has continued to increase at a rapid rate. The University budget for 1964-1965 amounted to 14 million Hong Kong dollars; that for 1989-1990, 910 million dollars. (In 1989, the exchange rate was HK$7.80=US$1.00.) The nominal increase was sixty-five times. Taking account of inflation (about sixfold) and increase in student enrolment (about fourfold) over the quarter-century, the real increase per student enrolled was about two and a half times. This was made possible by the very rapid economic growth of Hong Kong, and made necessary by the many new programme offerings and improved quality of instruction and research in the University.
The budgetary amounts cited in the last paragraph were the recur-rent expenditures for those years. Capital expenditures such as construc-tion of new buildings and acquisition of large pieces of equipment were not included therein. As a matter of fact, CUHK has been very generously financed with both its recurrent and capital needs. This contrasts sharply with the contemporaneous economic difficulties of universities in the English-speaking world, and with the rather tortuous and tortured experience of the universities in China.
The three Foundation Colleges had been private institutions, whereas the University is a public one. More than 80% of the funding of CUHK comes from the Hong Kong government; the remainder from t\Jition fees and private donations. (See Chapter 9 on the University's
benefactors) During the first few years of the existence of the Univer-sity, government funding was given in the form of direct grants. Sub-sequently, the University Grants Committee (now known as the University and Polytechnic Grants Committee [UPGC]) was set up by the government to handle matters related to higher education finance in Hong Kong.
The Hong Kong UPGC serves a function similar to that once served by the University Grants Committee in Britain, namely, to act as an intermediary and buffer between the government and the universities. One the one hand, it helps to ensure the academic freedom of the university against government interference, in the vital areas of appoint-ment of teachers, formulation of curricula, selection of students, and conducting and publishing of academic research. On the other hand, it also helps to ensure that the macroeconomic goals of the government to have an adequate and suitable supply of highly educated workers would be respected by the universities, and that the universities would spend the public funds accountably. Members of the UPGC are not officials of the Hong Kong government, but are prominent academics from over-seas, and respected public figures of Hong Kong. The Secretariat of the Committee is also independent of any government department, and is staffed by seconded civil servants.
For more than twenty years, the UPGC has followed generally the practice of financing by triennium plans. The devel_opment plans are drawn up by each institution, working from the level of the academic department upwards. These institutional plans are considered by the UPGC in conjunction with the government's estimates of the workforce requirements of the community. The Committee then makes its recom-mendation to the government on the amount to be allocated to each institution. The government usually accepts without change the recom-mendations of the Committee, and transfers the total sum to the Com-mittee for disbursement to the institutions. The bulk of the allocation to each institution under this system is known as the "block grant," which is a large sum not divided into smaller items. The institution is free to set its own priorities and make its own budget within the limits of this grant. Smaller portions of the allocation are made up of "earmarked grants," which may be utilized only for purposes specified by the UPGC.
The triennium and the block grant give the institutions very consid-erable room for manoeuver. The intermediary role of the UPGC also
reduces to a minimum the contacts ( and hence the potential for friction
or interference) between the institutions and government departments.
For more than two decades, CUHK has enjoyed a good working
relationship with the government, although certainly not without a fair
share of disagreements. But the disagreements never developed into an
exercise of the government's political or financial power to overwhelm
the University in the vital areas of academic freedom. On the contrary,
CUHK has always enjoyed a far higher degree of academic freedom and
administrative autonomy than any other university in Chinese-speaking
societies, or in many other parts of the world. The UPGC is the key to
that freedom.
To assist the institutions in preparing the cost estimates of their triennium plans, the UPGC has issued carefully constructed guidelines aimed at maximizing the use of human, space, monetary, and other resources, so as to minimize the wasteful use of public funds. On the other hand, government estimates of the workforce requirements of Hong Kong could only be approximate, given the openness of the economy. In general, the government estimates the required number of university graduates and professionals of various kinds for a number of years in the future, and determines the optimal rate of growth for each institution or for certain specific programmes. This is the most impor-tant factor in government decisions about funding for higher education. From the 1960s to the 1980s, the overall inclination of the government was deemed to be conservative, and it permitted only rather slow expan-. sion of higher education. Its main consideration was to prevent the
emergence of the problem of graduate unemployment.
However, since the mid-l 980s, the crisis of political confidence
together with the economic boom, have created an acute shortage of
tertiary educated persons in the community. In recent years, the govern-
ment response h.s been to increase tertiary enrolment rapidly. In order
to educate more students, the universities, polytechnics, and colleges
have been given greater allocations, and also have been asked to raise
their teacher-student ratios. These are new factors in the funding situa-
tion for CUHK and its sister institutions.
During its first two decades; the UPGC provided very little funding
for research. Research was considered a corollary activity which
teachers undertook,after teaching, with whatever resources that might
bl available in the university. Since the mid-1980s, however, the
Committee has adopted much more pro-active policies on research. It has published guidelines and provided funding to encourage teachers from all the institutions to compete for grants. The total amount avail-able is becoming larger year by year, and CUHK scholars have been among the most active and most successful applicants.
Within four decades, Hong Kong has grown from a less developed region into an affluent society. This has made it possible for the govern-ment to supply CUHK and the other institutions with funding on a generous scale. When the three private Colleges federated themselves into a public university, the new institution did not thereby become a government department, nor did its teachers become civil servants at the beck and call of senior government officials. CUHK and its teachers have always maintained a very high degree of autonomy and academic freedom. This is the most important tradition established during the past thirty years.
Material Resources
With a population of nearly six million living on ten thousand square kilometres of hilly terrain, Hong Kong is one of the most crowded territories on earth. CUHK is privileged to have a campus of more than one hundred and thirty hectares, and is the most richly endowed in land resources among all the educational institutions in Hong_ Kong:
During the early years of the three Colleges in the 1950s, material conditions were extremely poor. Each College could afford to rent only a small tenement in the city, which functioned as classroom, office, and dormitory for staff and students. Eventually, the Colleges were able to obtain financial support from overseas organizations or from the Hong Kong government to acquire more suitable accommodation -Chung Chi in Shatin, New Asia in Kowloon, and United on Hong Kong Island. But the New Asia campus was still rather small, and that of United even more so. After federation, the University rented a few floors in two bank buildings in Kowloon as its central offices. Subsequently, the govern-ment granted a large site adjacent to the Chung Chi campus, for building the headquarters of the University and new campuses of the other two Colleges. Site formation and construction was completed in stages, and one after another the University (1968), United College (1972), and New Asia College ( 1973) gave up their old locations in town and moved
to Shatin. Although the buildings first planned in the 1960s were
completed by the mid-1970s, construction has never stopped at the
University, as more and more instructional, research, recreational,
administrative, and residential buildings are designed and built.
In the mid-1980s, the University decided to establish a fourth col-
lege, so that all the Colleges could remain relatively small and acces-
sible to students within the large University. Shaw College was built on
a previously undeveloped part of the campus.
Over the decades, some one hundred buildings large and small have
been erected to house this academic community of more . than ten
thousand people.
The Chinese University of Hong Kong campus occupies a most
scenic location, and provides a very good environment for study and
contemplation. But enjoying such an environment has not been without
cost. Academic communities around the world are of two minds about
whether universities should be located within or outside urban centres.
The advantages of a downtown location are that it would enable the
university to keep in touch more easily with society, and be more
sensitive and responsive to its problems and needs. It would be more
convenient for the university to make use of all kinds of information
available in the city, and to offer its own expertise to society. A location
away from the city, .on the other hand, is removed from mundane
distractions, and the peace and quiet is more conducive to reflection.
Also, land value would be cheaper, and the campus could be more
spacious. There are certainly pros and cons to each kind of location.
During the early years of the University, transportation between Shatin
and the urban areas was not very convenient. Travelling from the new
campus to the city required more than an hour. The location was
definitely a rural one. Since the 1980s, however, with the development
of Shatin New Town and the modernization of the entire transport
system of Hong Kong, travel between CUHK and the city is much faster
and more convenient, and the campus can be said to combine the
advantages of both an urban and a suburban location.
With the three Colleges brought together on the same campus, instruction within the University could be organized much more centrally. Under the federal system, the three Colleges were " autonomous in planning and carrying out their teaching functions, and <the University was responsible only for coordinating admission and
graduation examinations. It soon became apparent that many students would benefit from attending certain classes in colleges other than their own, and some courses were designated as inter-collegiate courses. Before the Colleges moved together, these courses had been held either in the Colleges offering them, or in rented lecture rqoms in more accessible locations at Tsimshatsui or Central. When all the Colleges had moved on to the new campus, inter-collegiate courses naturally multiplied. Since each college remained very small in enrolment, many expensive resources, such as science laboratories, had to be shared. The sharing of classes and facilities created centripetal forces which even-tually led to the change from the federal to a unitary constitution, when the University was re-organized under new legislation in 1977.
If the three Colleges had each developed its own campus in Shatin, Kowloon, and Hong Kong Island, the history of the University might have been rather different.
Lands and buildings provide only an empty shell for a university. A university needs libraries, laboratories, computers, and other facilities for teaching and research to enable it to function.
The library is the centre of the intellectual life of a university. The richer its collection, the more open its resources, the more effective its services to teachers and students, the more vigourous would be the academic life. Before federation, each Foundation College had estab-lished its own library with mainly undergraduate teaching collections. During its first few years, the University rented one floor of a bank building in Kowloon to set up the University Library, a collection of more specialized books for teachers and postgraduate students. On the new campus, the University Library has its own large building. Initially, the university and college libraries remained separate entities. Under the new unitary constitution, the four libraries were merged into a unified system.
Over the decades, the library holdings have expanded rapidly. In 1963, the three college libraries together possessed fewer than two hundred thousand volumes, and only a limited number of academic journals. By 1991, the University Library System had a collection of one million one hundred thousand volumes, and subscription to some seven thousand periodicals. It is the largest academic library in Hong Kong, and one of the best stocked and most open libraries among all Chinese-speaking universities in the world. It is also the largest and
A New Society, New Knowledge, and a New University
most comprehensive bilingual library in the world that places equal emphasis on publications in both Chinese and English. With its sizeable annual budget, the library systematically acquires publications from all major Chinese-and English-speaking societies through purchase or exchange, and also selected items in other East Asian and West European languages. The great majority of the collection is in open stacks, and is professionally catalogued and circulated. With the instal-lation during the 1980s of electronic devices for circulation and for bibliographic searches and information retrieval, it has become an even more powerful centre for research.
Most of the books and periodicals acquired by the library were first recollllllended by the library committee of each faculty or department. The library collllllittee of each teaching unit is made up of teachers, and sets its own priority for spending its share of the library budget.
Teaching and research in the scientific disciplines require laboratories. Owing to geographical and financial constraints, it is not within the reach of Hong Kong to have the largest and most expensive equipment for, say, high energy physics. But all the hardware that is within the means of the territory can be said to be available. The most important turning point in the history of CUHK from this perspective was the establishment of the Science Centre on the Shatin campus, which pooled the resources of all the Colleges, and formed a firm foundation for subsequent development. As for the Faculty of Medicine, its teaching hospital is the central hospital for the six hundred thousand inhabitants of Shatin New Town, and is one of the most advanced hospitals in Southeast Asia.
The electronic computer has made itself indispensible for modern information and academic work. In 1967, CUHK imported from the United States an IBMl 130 computer, which was the first computer acquired by any tertiary education institution in Hong Kong. In the early 1970s, CUHK joined with the University of Hong Kong and the Hong Kong Polytechnic to purchase more powerful mainframe computers for use in an inter-institutional network. This was mainly for the use of science teachers and students, but was also available to those in the social science and business faculties, and to administrators.
Since the 1980s, the use of mainframe, mini-and micro-computers has become truly pervasive. Nowadays, CUHK has an IBM4381 and other mainframe computers, and also continues to operate in a network
with the other public-funded institutions. Since Hong Kong is a major world centre for the manufacture of chips and microcomputers, the most advanced personal computers, compatibles, and software make their appearance on campus very soon after they are launched elsewhere in the world. The development of Chinese-language software also brought immeasurable convenience to this bilingual university. Teachers and students from all faculties and departments have been using microcom-puters for wordprocessing or computation, and the machines number in the thousands on campus.
In recent years, the campus telephone system was updated after the completion of a network of optical fibre cables. This greatly facilitates the use of fax machines and e-mail within the University, across Hong Kong, and throughout the world. In all of CUHK in 1992, there were some one hundred fax machines for office use, and the number of staff and students who have used the e-mail system by now is about two thousand five hundred. The widespread use of these two advanced means of communication represents an important input of technology into the University, and symbolizes the close relationship between CUHK and Hong Kong society as well as with the global academic community.
The University in Operation
The Chinese University of Hong Kong receives�P inputs of human, material, and mental resources from Hong Kong society and from the world of learning, in order to carry out its pedagogic and scholarly functions. The operations of the University could be discussed in terms of the structure and contents of its curriculum, teaching methods and teaching materials, evaluation of student learning, academic research, student counselling, administration, and so on. In each of these aspects, the University and its Colleges have made very considerable progress during the past four decades.
Curricular Structure and Evaluation of Student Learning
In each society, senior members divide the knowledge which they possess into what ought, and what ought not, to be taught in the schools
A New Society, New Knowledge, and a New University
of that society. Modem education compartmentalizes school know ledge into distinct disciplines and subjects, each graded by level and organized into courses of instruction, drawn up in syllabi and teaching plans.
The lines separating disciplines, subjects, levels, and courses are not natural and immutable ones, but are redrawn from time to time according to the developments in the fields of learning and the changing needs of society. During this century, the cumulative effects of research from many lands h,ave brought significant changes to disciplinary boundaries. For example, the new disciplines of electronics and computer studies have arisen; biochemistry emerges from the interstices of chemistry and biology; history has been forming close ties with statistics and anthropology, and has moved away from literature; and interdisciplinary studies such as women's studies, regional studies, and studies of educa-tion, have become widespread. The causes and effects of these changes are part and parcel of the vitality of the universities in which they take place. CUHK has been very much a participant in these changes.
How deep and how broad an undergraduate curriculum should be is another question that does not have universal and immutable answers. Some school systems, such as in the former Soviet Union, and China since the 1950s, prefer their undergraduates to focus on one discipline. In these systems, tertiary education often takes place in single-discipline institutes, with relatively few comprehensive universities. Some other systems, such as the American, put much greater emphasis on the broadly based general education component in the undergraduate cur-riculum, in order to broaden the intellectual horizons of the students. Here, comprehensive universities predominate; students are expected to take courses from many disciplines, and major subject requirements often do not exceed one-third of the total course load. In British univer-sities, on the other hand, honours undergraduate curricula demand specialization in a principal subject, while more broadly based curricula lead to ordinary degrees, without honours. General education takes place through tutorials, private readings, and college life, rather than in a formally planned programme.
The Foundation Colleges and the University inherited the curricular traditions of the pre-war Chinese as well as the British and American systems. Consistently through its history, the University has stressed three basic components in its curriculum: the major subject, general
:,:-: education, and bilingual training in Chinese and English.
The Colleges were founded on different educational principles, and so had dissimilar curricular structures and requirements. 'At the time of federation, the University demanded uniformity only in admission and graduation examinations. Once matriculated, the students followed col-lege requirements in their coursework, and university requirements with the examinations. Moreover, the Colleges were very small and were able to offer very little choice of courses. Consequently, the students experienced a very inflexible curriculum.
In 1966, the University made the first reform of its examinations. Instead of a single nine-paper graduation examination at the end of the fourth year, it instituted a three-stage university-wide examination, to take place at the end of a student's second, third, and fourth years. The first stage was the Intermediate Examination, covering Chinese, English, major subject, minor subject, and an elective subject, a total of five papers. The other stages were the Degree Examination Part I, with three papers, and the Degree Examination Part II, with four papers. The seven papers of the degree examination consisted of five in the major subject, and two in the minor subject. One of the papers in the major subject could be substituted with a thesis written during the fourth year. This examination system provided the basic structure for curriculum design in all the Colleges and faculties. A student had to decide on a major and a minor department when first admitted to the University. During the first two years of the course, more or less equal attention was paid to the two languages, the major and minor disciplines, and general education. And in the last two years, the major and minor subjects were studied almost exclusively, with only a small amount of time devoted to general education. In the four-year course as a whole, the major dis-cipline occupied some 60% of the course load. This was probably the most reasonable compromise among all the curricular traditions in-herited by the University and its Colleges, and was applied throughout the University. Since the early 1970s, this curriculum prepared students for the honours bachelor degree, and there has been no provision for an alternative curriculum leading to an ordinary degree.
This curriculum structure was a practical expression of the three-pronged emphasis of CUHK on the languages, general education, and the major subject, and remained in force for some twenty years. Never-theless, the realization of its goals was not without some difficulty.
The Chinese University of Hong Kong has always considered high
standards in both Chinese and English as a matter of priority, and it is one of the few universitie. in the world which is truly bilingual in these �P languages in its teaching, research, publications, meetings, and ad-ministration. It demands strict lingusitic standards of its students in admission and coursework. Over the years, Chinese (in any of its spoken forms) has been the principal medium of instruction. Some two-thirds of the lectures are given in Chinese. Most of the other courses have been taught in English. But the two languages naturally serve different functions from department to department, depending on the state of the discipline in the world today. So different teaching units have different expectations of the bilingual abilities of their students, and it has been found unrealistic to insist on uniform standards or objectives of language teaching. Nevertheless, there is no disagreement about the general principle of bilingual competence, and some 10% of the course load of the four-year curriculum is devoted to the languages.
General education has been another consistent objective. During the
1960s and 1970s, there was no university-wide system of general educa-
tion, since this remained a college matter. The Colleges differed among
themselves in their arrangements, which ranged from specially designed
"integrated basic studies," to advising students to take elective courses
outside their departments or faculties, to asking each department to offer
a special course for students from other disciplines. In 1977, after the
constitutional change abolishing the federal structure, the University
became responsible for "subject-orientated teaching," while the Col-
leges were in charge of "student-orientated teaching." Since "student-
orientated teaching" was understood to have a general education
function, the arrangements for general education became even more
complex. Many students found it difficult to understand the aims of this
pot-pourri of offerings, and motivation was a problem. From a design
perspective, it was also unclear that a haphazard mix of courses could
reliably serve the purposes of broadening intellectual horizons and
providing the knowledge base needed by a university graduate of
present-day Hong Kong.
Hence, a complete overhaul of general education was undertaken by
5
the University in the mid-1980s. A Director of General Education was appointed to be in charge of all university-wide general education cour-.ses. New regulations now require each undergraduate to take six general education courses ( 15 % of the degree course load). More than a hundred
new courses have been designed and offered under the new regime. These belong to seven categories: logical thinking and quantitative techniques, Chinese civilization, other civili,zations, computer studies, art and humanities, natural science and medicine, and social science and management. In addition, there are a small number of courses offered by the Colleges. Students are required to select a course each from logical thinking and quantitative techniques and Chinese civilization, and �P choose freely from the other categories. A systematic basis for general education has been established for all students in the University, with a
large enough choice of offerings to serve individual needs.
An honours programme with heavy emphasis on the major subject,
intended to produce graduates of high quality, has been another consis-
tent aim of the curriculum of CUHK. During the early years of the
University, students were admitted directly by the Colleges; after the
constitutional change, they were admitted by teaching departments of
the University. Once admitted, a student was subject to the regulations
of the major department, which greatly restricted the choice of major
and minor courses. It was very difficult for a student to change depart-
ments, however legitimate the reasons. For an eighteen-year-old, be-
wildered by the complexities of higher education, and in need of
exploration, this was a very rigid system. Furthermore, even if a student
did not want to change majors, there were important contradictions
between coursework and examinations. A student would have studied
some twenty courses during the third and fourth years, but the degree
examination consisted of only seven papers ( covering the contents of
perhaps seven to ten courses). The class of honours awarded with the
degree depended solely on performance in the examinations, without
regard to the coursework. Students often felt compelled to strain them-
selves working at both requirements, or to make strategic choices which
were sometimes not of the highest educational value.
In 1986, the University Senate resolved to reform the system of
undergraduate coursework and examinations. Under the new system,
first year students are admitted by the faculties of arts, science, social
science, or business administration, and so on, and not by the depart-
ments within these faculties. During the first year, a student has only a
provisional major, not a formal commitment to a single discipline, and
is given a year to explore the offerings of the University. While the
heavy emphasis on the major discipline is maintained for the later years
A New Society, New Knowledge, and a New University
of the degree programme, students are also given more freedom to choose courses outside the major discipline, and could decide for them-selves whether to register for a minor discipline, or to take more courses from a number of disciplines outside the major. The most important reform, however, was to abolish the degree examinations and to sub-stitute a credit system. Degree and honours would be awarded on the basis of coursework credit alone. This new system allows for more flexibility and adaptability to meet the needs and interests of students in different disciplines, and is more easily compatible with the curriculum design of each academic department.
The programme was planned for coursework lasting over four years, but allows a student to carry a heavier or lighter course load each year, so as to complete the requirements within three to five years. During the early 1990s, when. the UPGC-funded institutions worked
_
together to coordinate their student recruitment through the joint admis-sions scheme, based on the Hong Kong Advanced Level Examination (taken at the end of Form Seven [Grade 13]). CUHK would have to make appropriate adjustments, e.g. allowing a flexible credit units sys-tem in the undergraduate curriculum.
Over thirty years the curriculum structure and evaluation of student attainments have undergone two major changes. The credit system now in fore'? is in line with i.temational trends, and has the flexibility to meet the needs of present-day Hong Kong. In spite of the'changes, however, CUHK has remained committed to bilingualism, general education, and a substantial major subject as the defining characteristics of its under-graduate curriculum.
Undergraduate teaching was the main mission of all Chinese.speak-ing universities and most English-speaking ones, at the time when the Foundation Colleges, and even CUHK, came into existence. The educa-tion of postgraduate students was at most a very small part of the function of most universities. The Foundation Colleges began with only undergraduate teaching, but eventually added postgraduate studies in a few selec!ed areas, such as advanced Chinese studies at New Asia, and Christian theology at Chung Chi.
Shortly after federation, CUHK established its Graduate School and School of Education, to provide post-baccalaureate courses of study and research; but these remained units with very small enrolments.
_:Throughout the 1960s, students registered for master degrees and the
diploma-in-education represented less than 2% of the student popula-tion. During the 1970s, greater emphasis began to be placed on postgraduate education, and the idea of a Master of Philosophy (M. Phil.) degree programme, stressing both advanced coursework and training in research, was introduced from British universities. More and more departments in the University began to offer M. Phil. programmes, and student enrolment gradually increased. By the early 1980s, the first two Doctor of Philosophy programmes were offered in Chinese studies and electronics; other doctoral programmes were added later. Nowadays the Graduate School admits students to courses leadipg to master or doctoral degrees in more than sixty fields, and post-bac-calaureate students constitute one-sixth of the student population. Evi-dently, postgraduate education has become an important part of the overall curricular deployment of the University, complementing under-graduate teaching as well as the research work of the teachers.
Throughout its history, the Graduate School has maintained a policy
. of conservative development, permitting the offering of new program-mes or courses only when it could. be assured of adequate intellectual and other resources. This is one of the reasons why CUHK enjoys a much lower rate of attrition of postgraduate students than many other institutions. By now, CUHK is no longer a "four-year college" con-cerned only with undergraduate teaching, but a research university of international standing.
Another significant development in the overall curricular deploy-ment of the University is the long-term increase in the proportion of professional education. The Colleges were essentially liberal arts in-stitutions, the only professional programmes being those in social work and commerce. After federation, academic programmes continued to predominate. The establishment of the Lingnan Institute of Business Administration and the School of Education during the late 1960s were the first attempts by the University to strengthen professional education. By the early 1990s, professional studies have come to occupy a position in the University almost equal to that of academic studies, with programmes in business administration, computer studies, divinity, education, engineering, journalism, law, medicine, nursing, physical education, public administration, social work, translation, and so on. This trend towards professionalization is in response to the needs of Hong Kong, and is consonant with similar trends in many other
A New Society, New Knowledge, and a New University
societies. CUHK has evolved from a traditional university into a
modern multiversity.
It is not only the teaching units that have become more and more
diversified. So, too, have the students. Until recently, university students
were young men and women in their late teens to early twenties, who
moved directly from secondary school to university. But in the post-in-
dustrial society, mature men and women with long years of work ex-
perience often find it desirable or necessary to attend university. Some
may continue at their jobs and study part-time; others may leave
employment to concentrate on their studies. They want to acquire new
knowledge, skills, and qualifications, to help them with their lives and
their careers. They bring their life and work experience to enrich and to
challenge the university. Since 1982, CUHK has been offering part-time
bachelor degree programmes for adult students who remain in employ-
ment. There are now programmes in nine major subjects, and the enrol-
ment is one-seventh that of all undergraduates. This is another area of
significant change in curricular deployment, undertaken in response to
societal need, and congruent with international trends.
Since the early 1980s, with expansion of the Graduate School, diversification and professionalization of programme offerings, and the introduction of part-time degree courses in the evening, CUHK has taken on a new aspect. These changes have not threatened the traditional emphasis of the University on bilingualism, general education, and an honours major subject. Rather, the reforms and changes have strengthened these old characteristics, and prepared them for further development.
Curricular Contents
The Foundation Colleges were established with the higher education laws of the Nationalist Chinese government in mind, and each main-tained the minimum of three faculties to qualify as universities under those stipulations. In their faculties of arts, science, and commerce, the Colleges taught from the books and lecture notes that the refugee scholars had brought with them from universities in China. At federa-tion, CUHK had four faculties: arts, commerce, social science, and science, each consisting of four to five academic departments. Each
.department offered some twenty courses. By the early 1990s, the
University has seven faculties: arts, busine.ss administration, education, engineering, medicine, science, and social science. These are sub-divided into more than fifty academic departments, which offer a total of more than 1400 undergraduate courses. Course offerings have multi-plied over thirty years. What is more important, however, is the quality of courses and the manner in which new courses are adopted.
Some educational systems in the world are highly centralized. The contents of the curriculum in primary, secondary, and tertiary schools are determined by government ministries, and textbooks at all levels are published or prescribed by the ministries. In Hong Kong, on the con-trary, universities and colleges are all autonomous and have not been subordinate to any government department. Selection of curricular con-tent, adoption of books and materials, and recommendations for library acquisitions all have been decided by the teachers alone, without refer-
)
ence to any political agencies or officials. To introduce a new course, or to make fundamental changes to an existing course, a teacher only needs to prepare a proposal with course outline and bibliography, and submit it to the board of the academic department. With the endorsement of the department, then of the faculty board and finally of the University Senate, the proposed course becomes an official part of the curriculum of the University. All these academic boards are composed of Univer-sity teachers. Under the existing system in Hong Kong, of which The Chinese University of Hong Kong Ordinance is a .part, all these academic boards enjoy complete autonomy in academic matters within the University, and are protdcted from interference even from the governing Council of the University, or from the UPGC. It is also within the authority of Senate to establish new academic departments or programmes of study; there is no need to apply to the UPGC unless large amounts of extra funding are required.
The examination of proposals for new courses, programmes, or departments by the academic boards within the University is based first on academic criteria, and secondly on financial criteria. If a proposal is intellectually and pedagogically sound, does not overlap needlessly with existing offerings, and does not go beyond the ways and means of the University, it would be acceptable. Over the decades, the curricula of the Colleges and of CUHK have never been subject to political ex-amination, supervision, or censorship from any government or party; nor have there been any forbidden zones for thought or expression. The
freedom to determine its own curricular contents hitherto. enjoyed by
CUHK has been much greater than that enjoyed by universities in other
Chinese-speaking societies or many other parts of the world. This is the
most precious tradition of the University and its Colleges. Teachers'
autonomy in curricular matters, and scrupulous vigilance over intellec-
tual and academic honesty, are a sine qua non for maintaining the
standards and vitality of a university.
Given the freedom to teach according to their own lights, the
teachers of the University can make the best use of their learning and
expertise, and the resources provided by the University, to introduce
from around the world the most advanced knowledge and skills. They
can test these against Hong Kong conditions and experiences, reformu-
late them for broader applicability, and continuously improve their
teaching and research. This dual trend of internationalization and in-
digenization has been the refrain in the development of curricular con-
tent at CUHK over the decades.
The Foundation Colleges began with teaching materials brought
from China, which consisted of certain traditional knowledge from
China, and selected traditional and modem knowledge from Britain and
America. The choice was rather narrow, and the contents were often not
rel.vant to local conditions. The curricular contents nowadays are still
derived mostly from sources in Chinese or English (with smaller
amounts in Japanese, French, German, and Italian), but they come from
much broader and more ecumenical origins. The illustrations and ap-
plications cited in instruction are more and more based on Hong Kong
experiences. In the arts, social sciences, education, business studies, and
medicine, local observations, case histories, and research have become
important components of the teaching at the University. In science and
engineering, local specimens, environments, cases, practices, and re-
search are also very much taken into account. The teachers apply what
they have learnt from studying and working overseas, and test this
against Hong Kong conditions. They either conduct specially designed
studies, or more simply just observe and reflect. What they discover
would be worked into their lectures and tutorials. In this way, progress
is made towards the internationalization and localization of the contents �P of their teaching. More formally, a number of professional organizations based ,.�Pin Hong Kong have called upon scholars from CUHK and other
institutions to collaborate with eminent practitioners, to formulate local professional standards, and to set local qualifying examinations to replace overseas ones. These are major steps towards the indigenization of professional education, both on campus and in the community.
Over four decades, the teachers and students of the three Colleges and of CUHK have continued to grow and mature in an atmosphere of freedom of thought and expression, and of academic autonomy. They have made good use of the many Chinese and Western values, and knowledge, input into the University, to develop diversified, localized, and internationalized curricula. This is part of the cause, as well as the effect, of the continuing de-colonization, and evolution towards a dis-tinct society, experienced by Hongkongans since the 1970s.
Teaching Materials and Methods
Hong Kong is a major centre for the international trade in print and audio-visual publications in Chinese and English. It is not difficult for teachers at CUHK to find and select teaching materials representing all kinds of academic viewpoints or ideological positions. The University is also well funded to purchase every year large quantities of books and other materials for the library and the media centre. These factors have greatly facilitated the internationalization and localization of teaching at the University.
One of the basic considerations in teaching methods is the teacher-student ratio. Over the decades, CUHK has been able to maintain average ratios of between 1:12 and 1:16. These were policy decisions which have been realizable because resources have been adequate. In practice, of course, class sizes vary depending on course and level. To avoid wasteful use of resources, the University requires a minimum of eight enrolled students for each undergraduate course. The largest clas-ses are limited by classroom design and safety regulations to a maxi-mum enrolment of about three hundred. With the larger introductory classes, the lecturers are assisted by teaching assistants employed by the academic department, who are usually postgraduate students.
The most c.mmon mode of teaching at CUHK is by lecture and tutorial. This is also a merging together of the Chinese, British, and American traditions that the University and its Colleges inherited. Nor-mally, an undergraduate course meets for two hours of lectures and one
A New Society, New Knowledge, and a New University
hour of tutorial every week. During lectures, the teac;her expounds on the subject matter to the entire class. In tutorials, the students are divided into groups ranging in size from a few to twenty students. The students raise questions, discuss, debate, or present their own essays, under the moderation of the lecturer or a teaching assistant. The topic of a tutorial session may be some chapters of assigned readings, or a progress report of student research, and so on.
Most Chinese-speaking universities rely on lecturing combined with private study by students of textbooks and lecture notes; seldom do they resort to tutorials in which the students are encouraged to do most of the talking. It has often been claimed that Chinese students do not like to speak up in class. CUHK has been using the tutorial for nearly three decades. Whil. it certainly has not been clear sailing all the time, the objectives of training_,students to express their ideas and to accustom themselves to free discussion have been achieved to a considerable degree. Dialogue is a basis for learning, for the advancement of scholar-ship, and for an open society. Dialogue demands not just the ability to speak, but also to interact with others in listening and speaking. This is the basic idea of the tutorial at CUHK, an ideal which cannot possibly be achieved through teaching by chalk and talk.
Where lecturing itself is concerned, during the early decades, the only teaching aid available was the blackboard. A few overhead projec-tors and other electrical devices were added during the late 1960s. In the late 1970s, the Senate established a Committee on Instructional Development, with the responsibility of acquiring and encouraging teachers to use various kinds of audio-visual aids. Later on, instructional development officers were appointed to produce on order from teachers various kinds of software for electrical and electronic machines. The use of educational technology gradually became more widespread, especial-ly with joint production projects between teachers and instructional development officers. Some of these products have attained levels of quality which make them suitable for use beyond the courses for which they were first�P made, and there are plans to market them beyond the University.
Student learning cannot be confined to the classroom and the study room. Teaching at CUHK also emphasizes student-active methods such as experiments, practicums, field studies, and library searches. These
.'' methods are integral parts of the planned curriculum of various
programmes in the University. Over the decades, with richer and more diversified human and material resources input into the University, these practical methods have become more widely used and effective. The University hopes that tutorials and practical methods would help to develop students into independent thinkers, capable of playing leading roles as intellectuals or professionals in a free society. While CUHK certainly has not lived up to this promise as fully as it might wish, nonetheless it has achieved its fair share of success.
Student Counselling and Student Life
Student counselling is an important function of education. Each of the Foundation Colleges had its own Dean of Students who was respon-sible, according to the values and rules of the College, for moral educa-tion, assisting students in difficulty, and disciplining those students who had broken the rules. Under the federal constitution, student guidance remained a college matter, and the University did not have any respon-sibility there. After the constitutional change, the University began to handle more and more student affairs, and eventually set up an Office of Student Affairs to work in coordination with the College Deans. The
College Deans also modified their roles to reduce the image of tutelage and discipline, and instead to stress service and counselling. In recent years, the office of a University Dean of Students '?>'as created, to coordinate all university and college student services, such as scholar-ships and financial aid, psychological counselling, career counselling and placement, student facilities management, and technical support for student activities.
The Colleges and the University all have autonomous, democrati-cally constituted studentunions, each with its own representative coun-cil, executive committee, as well as editorial board of its newspaper, all elected by universal student suffrage. The unions organize their own recreational and cultural activities and social-political movements, which will be detailed in a separate chapter. The staff of the College and University Student Offices have always been responsible only for liaison and exchange of opinions with the student unions, and never have had any authority to supervise, manage, or direct the unions. This is another precious.trndition of the freedom, auotonomy, and tolerance ofCUHK.
Student hostels are another important facet of university life. With a large campus, CUHK has rather more hostels than the other tertiary institutions, and hence a higher proportion of residential students. The director of each hostel also shares in the responsibility of student coun-selling and informal education. Over the decades, each College has operated its own hostels for undergraduates, while the University has a postgraduate hostel. The Colleges have adopted policies such as "mini-mum one year of residence," to ensure that students who expressed the need or the desire to live in hostel would enjoy the right of at least one year in residence.
The hostels have also served as an avenue by which academic traditions from other cultures could be introduced into the University. For instance, the Adam Schall Residence at United College has been entrusted to the Society of Jesus and the Mary knoll Sisters for its design, building, and management, thereby bringing the university traditions of Ireland, the United States, and France onto the campus of the University.
Research
Universities are engaged in the mutually complementary tasks of trans-mitting and creating knowledge. Among the tertiary institutions in Hong Kong, CUHK was the first to give structural expression to the emphasis on research. Shortly after federation, three research institutes were established, namely, Social Studies and Humanities (1965), Science and Technology (1965), and Chinese Studies (1967). Under each institute were a number of research centres or groups. From the 1960s to 1980s, the institutes and centres have undergone some reorganization, but have remained nonetheless the mainstays for promoting and coordinating research at the University. The institutes encourage teachers of the University to propose and conduct research, and to engage in scholarly exchanges with corresponding organizations in other parts of the world. They also raise funds from local and international donors to support these scholarly efforts.
The Institute of Social Studies and the Humanities (and especially its Social Research Centre) was instrumental in bringing to Hong Kong the methods and climate of social scientific research. Prior to the mid-1960s, Hong Kong had seen only isolated instances of social survey or
research. The activities of the Institute marked the beginning of sys-tematic, well-planned studies in social science in Hong Kong. It has made considerable contributions in collecting and analyzing data on the economics, mass communications, geography, and society of Hong Kong, and also of South China and Southeast Asia. The Institute of Science and Technology also has made significant contributions in computer studies, marine science, traditional Chinese materia medica, and other areas. The Institute of Chinese Studies has supported research utilizing traditional sinological as well as social scientific methods, in exploring diverse aspects of Chinese tradition, in comparative studies, and in linguistic and translation studies. The three institutes have also devoted much attention to promoting scholarly communication with researchers in Hong Kong, other Chinese-speaking and English-speaking societies, and in East Asia and the West.
As a small territory, even though quite affluent, Hong Kong cannot afford to support research which necessitates large investments of land and money. Hence, high energy physics and such other expensive areas of pure theoretical investigation have to remain beyond the reach of Hong Kong researchers. On the other hand, with its strategic location, convenient transportation network, and free flow of information, ideas, and publications, Hong Kong is well situated for many other kinds of research and scholarly exchange. CUHK scholars can be found working on many topics in the humanities and social and natural_ sciences which do not call for heavy investment in hardware, or which have some ap-plied value. The past three decades have witnessed a continuous increase in interest and commitment to research, from the 1960s when only a few teachers in the University did research in their after-teaching hours, to the present day when a far higher proportion of teachers consider re-search to be just as important as teaching in their work as academics. This development is a consequence of the longterm change in the academic qualifications of teachers of the University. The structure of the Ph.D. degree around the world stresses training for research, and propagates the attitudes, methods, and styles of the academic profession. Their training places a high value on research and publication. As a larger and ever larger proportion of the academic staff at CUHK hold the Ph.D. degree, so does this value find ever broader acceptance.
Hong Kong in general, and CUHK in particular, never had any need for a central academic authority to plan or direct all research efforts. All
research projects undertaken by CUHK teachers have been selected and
designed by themselves, not assigned from on high. The right to choose
one's own topic is a cornerstone in the edifice of academic freedom, and
has been well respected. On the other hand, academic researchers in
their choice of topics are likely to be attracted to�Ptheoretical issues or to
certain fashionable areas of interest, which may not be always relevant
to the current needs of society. In the past, the Hong Kong government
did not pay much attention to, or grant funding for, academic research.
Since the mid-1980s, however, it has begun to show some interest in this
area. The UPGC has increased greatly the amount of funding to support
research in its institutions. Some of the grant money has been earmarked
for certain strategic areas or topics, in order to encourage university
teachers to work on them. This way of providing some direction by
inducement rather than coercion has received positive response from
many scholars at CUHK and other schools.
In order to -strengthen its research capacity, the University
reorganized its research structure during 1988-1991. It also expanded
its efforts to raise funds from public and private sources (see appendix 8
for details of research institutes and centres).
Over nearly thirty years, the long-term trends of research at CUHK
have been an increase in activities, internationalization of methods and
standards, and localization of human and material resources. Reorganiz-
ing the research establishment and increases in government funding
could be considered as reinforcements for these trends.
Administration
Teaching, research, and student services require planning, coordination,
management, and other forms of administrative support. These ac-
tivities take place within the framework established by Hong Kong
government legislation, namely, The Chinese University of Hong Kong
Ordinance of 1963, later repealed and replaced by The Chinese Univer-
sity of Hong Kong Ordinance of 1976.
During the early years of the University, under the federal constitu-
tion, most administrative tasks still belonged to the Colleges, and the . University required only a relatively simple administrative structure . .. Under the Vice-Chancellor, there were the Registrar, the Librarian, and �Pthe Bursar. The Presidents of the Foundation Colleges also rotated as
Pro-Vice-Chancellor of the University. The university administration was responsible only for the admission and graduation examinations, the appointment of teachers at senior lecturer or higher ranks, matters relating to the Graduate School and the research institutes, and transfer of government funding to the Colleges. As the University became larger, and the workload multiplied, a University Secretary was added to share the work with the Registrar. After the constitutional change in 1977, most of the administrative chores of the Colleges now known as the constituent CoUeges, as well as the staff previously in charge of them, were transferred to the much enlarged university administrative structure.
In the early 1990s, the Vice-Chancellor is assisted by two to three senior professors appointed as Pro-Vice-Chancellors, to help provide overall leadership to the University. They work with the officers of the University with statutorily defined responsibilities, namely, the Registrar, the Secretary, the Bursar, the Librarian, and the University Dean of Students. The Registrar is accountable to the Senate, and is in charge of the administrative matters related to teaching. Assistant Registrars are assigned to each faculty, to assist its Dean. The Secretary is in charge of personnel matters, official publications of the University, and liaison with the public -and the alumni. The Secretary also serves as the Secretary to the governing Council of the University, composed of eminent members of the Hong Kong community. The Bursar is respon-sible for the finances of the University, and is accountable to the Finance Committee of Council. The Librarian is responsible for the University Library System, and the, Dean, of Students, the Office of Student Affairs. In addition, there is the Director of the Buildings Office, in charge of planning and maintaining the physical plant.
Over the decades, the highest decision-making body in the day-to-day functioning of CUHK has been the Administrative and Planning Committee (AAPC) of the University Council. AAPC is chaired by the Vice-Chancellor, and its secretary is the University Secretary. Under the federal constitution, the other members of AAPC were the Presidents of the Foundation Colleges and the Bursar. Under the new constitution, members of the committee include the Pro-Vice-Chancellors, the Deans of the Faculties, the Heads of the Colleges, and so on. It meets once a week, and functions as the cabinet of the Vice-Chancellor.
As the University continues to grow in size and complexity, its
A New Society, New Knowledge, and a New University
adminstrative structure needs to be overhauled from time to time to ensure optimal effectiveness. In recent years, the committee system and administrative units have been undergoing extensive reorganization, so as to rationalize the existing structure and make it more accountable. Also, in response to developmental needs arid a changing environment, two new offices were established: the Office of Industrial and Business Development to liaise with the Hong Kong business community, espe-cially with regard to "high tech" research and development; and the Office of Academic Links, to promote exchanges with the academic communities in China and overseas. This complements the reorganiza-tion of the research establishment.
A basic principle in the administration of CUHK is that it is governed by its teachers. Most of the boards and committees are com-posed of teachers, and most of the major administrative posts have been filled by teachers in rotation. This arrangement may not always ensure the very highest degree of efficiency in management, but it does prevent confrontation between administrators and teacher-researchers, which could greatly hinder the functioning of a university.
The nominal head of CUHK is the Chancellor, who is the Governor of Hong Kong. Observing the principle of university autonomy, the Governor does not supervise or direct the operation of the University; but, rather, remains at a discrete distance, to avoid any suspicion of interference. The relations between the University and the government are conducted through the UPGC.
The Output from CUHK
The University receives inputs of values, knowledge, teachers, students, funds, and material resources from Hong Kong society and from the international academic community, to enable it to carry out its functions in teaching, research, student services, and so on. The outputs of the University include graduates, knowledge, values, and services.
Graduates
The first graduating class of CUHK consisted of only a few hundred students. In recent years, each class has more than two thousand. Over
three decades, the University has awarded more than thirty thousand bachelor degrees to its students. Benefiting from their studies and cam-pus life, these graduates have enhanced their abilities to participate and to play creative parts in the economic, social, political,-and cultural life of Hong Kong society. Their Chinese University of Hong Kong ex-perience will enable most of them to make greater contributions throughout their lives.
Most students, upon graduating, seek employment in Hong Kong. A minority pursue advanced studies. During the 1960s, industrialization in Hong Kong was enjoying an initial success, but the economic demand for university graduates was still rather limited, and CUHK graduates did not have very many career choices. Recognition of qualifications in itself was not an issue. Before federation, the Foundation Colleges had held joint diploma examinations, and the diploma so awarded had been recognized by the Hong Kong government and evaluated as a qualifica-tion just one year below the level of the bachelor degree of University of Hong Kong. Many overseas universities had actually recognized that diploma as equivalent to their own bachelor degrees. Shortly after federation, the Hong Kong government and the Commonwealth univer-sities gave recognition to CUHK degree as being on a par with that awarded by the University of Hong Kong. But the general public needed a few more years before it was ready to accept fully the new institution. Through the efforts and creditable performance of the _early graduates, CUHK degree eventually won the acceptance of the overwhelming majority of local employers.
However, even by the early 1970s, employment opportunities for most university graduates were still confined to a few fields of work. Most graduates, especially those from the arts and science faculties, became secondary school teachers, and soon make themselves success-ful careers in the rapidly expanding school system. Graduates from the business administration, social work, and journalism departments, on the other hand, usually could find work which closely matched their training in these emergent occupations. And since there were relatively few graduates in these fields from other institutions, CUHK alumnae and alumni formed the majority in some of them.
By the late 1970s, the economy and society of Hong Kong had become much more diversified. So had the employment opportunities of CUHK graduates. In recent years, only a dwindling minority of
graduates become secondary school teachers. Supply and demand in the
teaching profession has been near equilibrium; and in any case,
graduates now enjoy a much broader range of choices of careers in
which to make their contributions.
The proportion of graduates who decide to cont.nue their studies
also has increased over the decades, as Hong Kong became more af-
fluent, and could better afford to have some young people remain in
school for a. longer period of time. Through further studies, many of
them have become originators of knowledge, and contribute what they
discover to the world of learning. Many hundreds of CUHK graduates
are serving as teachers and researchers in universities in Hong Kong or
abroad. This may be considered as a feedback from CUHK to the
international academic community.
See Chapter 10 for more details on the alumnae and alumni.
As for the output of knowledge and values by the University, this
has been mainly in the form of publications, extramural courses, and
consultation services.
Teachers of the University publish their research findings in articles
carried by local and international journals. Several units of the Univer-
sity also publish their own periodicals and monographs. Many of these
articles and periodicals enjoy very high reputations in Hong Kong or
internationally.
In 1968, the University set up its Publications Office to publish
academic books and journals. During the first decade, some twenty
items were produced every year. In 1977, the office was reorganized as
The Chinese University Press. In recent years, the Press publishes
annually forty to fifty books in Chinese or English, which are marketed
both locally and overseas. It is one of the largest academic publishers in
the world which regularly works in both Chinese and English, and is the
largest academic press in Hong Kong. It adheres strictly to the standard
peer review procedures. Most of its publications are in the fields of
Hong Kong studies or Chinese studies, although there is also a sig-
nificant list not in these areas. Manuscripts are submitted from within
CUHK, from elsewhere in Hong Kong, and from around the world.
The Department of Extramural Studies was established in 1965, as the first major effort to serve the community through adult education . .. In that year, one hundred and forty courses were offered. These were attended by a total of more than four thousand members of the public. In
recent years, some two thousand courses are offered annually, with an
enrolment of more than fifty thousand. The current courses are in
academic, professional, recreational, and practical areas. Over the
decades, the department has been one of the most important providers of
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